Matt Walsh on the inevitable downfall of the "gay rights" movement

The present advance of the "gay rights" movement, illustrated so egregiously in the firing of Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich, is a temporary phenomenon. Like all tyrannical movements, it will have its day and then take its place alongside all other such aberrations on the ash heap of history. As Matt Walsh points out, it is inevitable.

Don’t you people read? Haven’t you learned anything from history? ‘Advancements’ earned through tyranny never endure. You can only win a debate by suffocating your opposition for so long. Your strategy is doomed for failure, because it has always failed.

In the name of ‘fighting for the freedom to love,’ you’ve utilized hate. For the sake of ‘tolerance,’ you’ve wielded bigotry. In order to push ‘diversity,’ you’ve been dogmatic.

You are everything you accuse your opponents of being, and you stand for all the evil things that you claim they champion.

You are exposed. We see you for what you are: a force of destruction and division.

You showed your hand, and now you’ll lose the game.

It’s inevitable.

Marriage has, had, and always will have, by definition, a certain character and purpose; a character and purpose centered around, above all things, the family. Marriage is the foundation through which a thriving and lasting civilization sees to the propagation of itself. Human beings can only reproduce by means of ‘heterosexuality,’ and this reality sets the ‘heterosexual’ union apart. Marriage is meant to be the context in which this reproduction occurs.

Marriage is many things, but it is also this. And ‘this’ can never be removed from it, no matter the direction of the political winds, or the motion of the shifting sands of public opinion.

Marriage and the family are dimensions of the same whole. They cannot be detached from one another. They, as a whole, as an institution, can only be weakened — not erased or redefined. And so the campaign to protect and strengthen the institution was and is designed to do just that. It was never about ‘legislating love’ or imposing intolerance or ‘discriminating against gay people,’ or any other silly bumper sticker platitude.

You want to be free to love? You are. You always have been.

Heterosexuals don’t claim to monopolize love; only reproduction. Me, I love in many ways and in many directions. I love my wife, yes, and I also love my parents, and my country, and football, and hamburgers. These are all different kinds and degrees of love, yet still love.

But, alas, only one of these loves can (or should) result in the creation of a biological family. Thus, this love carries with it a certain distinction and a certain responsibility.

Bigotry? There is nothing bigoted about it. This is mere science. You see, bigotry only enters into the conversation when you try to destroy a man’s life just for participating in the conversation.

You are the agents of bigotry, my friends. You. You are what you say we are.

Voddie Baucham: "Gay" is not the "new black"

From the "Have a dose of your own medicine" department

Sometimes, the best way to illustrate the absurdity of the Stupid People is to shove their absurdity right back in their face.

ROCKVILLE, Md., Dec. 12, 2013 /Christian Newswire/ -- Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays (PFOX) has filed a sexual orientation discrimination complaint with the Department of Justice and the Department of Education against the Montgomery County, Maryland Board of Education and its School Superintendent, Joshua Starr.

PFOX requests the federal agencies initiate an investigation into the discriminatory practices of Superintendent Starr and the Montgomery County school board and to oversee a remedial program to ensure diversity and non-discrimination against ex-gays.

"Starr misused his official position as school superintendent to gain access to students and indoctrinate them with his prejudicial bias against the ex-gay community," said Regina Griggs, executive director of PFOX. "The Department of Justice has investigated complaints against schools for discriminating against transgenders -- those who have changed their gender identity. The ex-gay community -- those who have changed their sexual orientation -- asks for equal treatment from our federal government."

After PFOX distributed ex-gay flyers to high school students as part of the schools' flyer distribution program for non-profit organizations, Starr publicly denigrated PFOX and former homosexuals by calling the actions of PFOX "reprehensible and deplorable" and labeling the flyer's sexual orientation freedom stance as "a really, really disgusting message."

"PFOX's flyers provided information on unwanted same-sex attractions, discouraged student name calling, and urged tolerance for former homosexuals," Griggs said. "Starr does not respect real diversity. As school superintendent, Starr's actions make it impossible for Montgomery County public schools to provide an atmosphere where everyone is treated fairly and with respect, and free from discrimination and abuse, as mandated by its sexual orientation nondiscrimination policy.

"When the school superintendent promotes intolerance of former homosexuals, then students and teachers will follow his example and learn to disrespect sexual minorities like the ex-gay community. Superintendent Starr cannot be allowed to use his official position to display hate against any group of people just because he disagrees with their sexual orientation.

"Although PFOX has participated in the MCPS flyer distribution program for five years, Starr and the school board admitted that they closed the entire program in order to keep out ex-gays. Their actions are reminiscent of the 1950s Jim Crow South, when public pools were closed rather than allow the participation of African-Americans."

Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays & Gays is the leading ex-gay advocacy organization.

Scalia leaves no doubt about his position on same sex "marriage"

The Supreme Court will wait until tomorrow, the final day of its session, to hand down its much anticipated ruling on same sex "marriage." However, Justice Antonin Scalia has already made his views on the subject, as well as his views on the limited role of the judicial branch, crystal clear.

Let us pray his views represent the majority of the Court.

As the Supreme Court prepares to rule this week on the legality of federal and state bans on same-sex “marriage,” Justice Antonin Scalia has said there is no “right to homosexual conduct” granted by the United States Constitution.

Scalia, 77, told an audience of lawyers and judges at the North Carolina Bar Association Friday that matters of morality should be decided by the public, not unelected judges who set themselves up as “moral arbiters.”

According to Scalia, moral issues such as gay marriage have no “scientifically demonstrable right answer” and thus have no business being decided by the court. Instead, society must determine as a whole what they deem moral and acceptable and make laws that reflect that.

Scalia made his point with humor, joking that as a judge, “I accept for the sake of argument, for example, that sexual orgies eliminate social tensions and ought to be encouraged.” But, he quickly added, “Rather, I am questioning the propriety, the sanity of having a value-laden decision such as this made for the entire society by unelected judges.”

Scalia, a 1986 appointee of President Reagan and now the longest-sitting member of the high court, has long maintained a strictly originalist view of the Constitution, insisting that it must be interpreted through the lens of its authors’ intentions. He once told an audience at Southern Methodist University that far from being a “living document,” the Constitution is, “dead, dead, dead.” On Friday, he told the North Carolina lawyers that judges who find rights to “homosexual conduct” or abortion in the Constitution are in error.

“When the Constitution was adopted, all those acts were criminal throughout the United States and remained so for several centuries,” said Scalia. In particular, he cited “laws against private consensual sodomy … that existed in perfect conformity with the Constitution for over 200 years.”

He slammed the Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion as an egregious example of judicial moralizing he believes was rooted in a flawed vision of the Constitution as a living document.

He expressed a similar sentiment in a 2011 interview with California Lawyer, saying “You want a right to abortion? There’s nothing in the Constitution about that. But that doesn’t mean you cannot prohibit it. Persuade your fellow citizens it’s a good idea and pass a law.”

“That’s what democracy is all about,” added Scalia. “It’s not about nine superannuated judges who have been there too long, imposing these demands on society.”

Eric Teetsel: Winning the marriage debate in a culture amusing itself to death

A very helpful article, posted at Public Discourse:

Here’s what we must not do: sacrifice our principles. Better to lose a thousand elections than win in sycophantic appeals to the lowest common denominator. Christians, at least, can rely on the long view of God’s redemptive story. We have already read the final page of human history; we know how the story ends. How utterly meaningless is the next election cycle viewed from this perspective?

Until that final chapter comes to pass, the responsibility is ours to be active in the present. And since we aren’t about to gain a slew of celebrity endorsements, we have to make ourselves and our ideas as attractive to the “persuadables” as possible. Forget beating the entrenched opposition. When we debate in the public square and in social media, our goal should be to win those silent observers whose commitments are shallow and subject to change.

This week, the Supreme Court will issue decisions in two cases involving the meaning and purpose of marriage. Whatever the results, our work to rebuild a culture of marriage and family will continue. Restoration will require that we better brand ourselves and make our case more attractive.

In a 1972 article in Philosophy & Rhetoric, Wayne Brockriede describes the art of communication in terms of sexual conduct. Like sex, argument occurs between human beings who bring their whole selves to the conversation, including personal histories and philosophical presuppositions (whether they know it or not). And, as in sex, participants in conversation can be considerate of these facts and lovingly negotiate them as part of the act, or manipulate them to personal advantage, or ignore them completely and carry on without regard for the others’ welfare at all. The first is arguing as a lover; the second as a seducer; the third as a rapist.

Too often, conservatives—including me—fall into the third category with our derision and condemnation. Not only is this unbecoming of people aspiring to virtue, it is ineffective in winning others to our cause.

Arguing as a lover is better. It frees us to acknowledge our personal faults and the faults in our arguments while remaining committed to our position and allowing our interlocutor to save face in the majority of instances in which our case is superior. As we woo the person across from us (and—remember—the audience watching from home) we are funny, self-effacing, merciful, and confident.

Winning the affections of the audience also means using sources of authority that appeal to them. This is not a new idea; it goes back as far as Aristotle. In contemporary culture, the Constitution is not considered authoritative. Though it pains me to say it, few people care about what the founding fathers said. (Those who do are already interning at the Heritage Foundation.)

I know what you’re thinking. “But the Federalist Papers are important!” Indeed, they are, and there’s a time and a place for discussing them. But when we lead with them and rely solely on such works, we fail. The current generation is more interested in doers. Martin Luther King, Jr., was a phenomenal thinker and writer, but if not for his actions he would not be the iconic leader we consider him today. Thanks in part to writers such as Eric Metaxas, the lives of William Wilberforce and Dietrich Bonhoeffer provide us with examples of conservative men of conviction whose values were reflected in their actions.

Each of us ought to be part of the recovery of a marriage and family culture. The work of academics and policy advocates is vital, but artists, musicians, pastors, teachers, and all the rest have a contribution to make. The most compelling source of authority in any argument is your own life. Your conversation partner wants to know how your values have changed the way you live, and whether yours is a life worth emulating. Do I want to be that kind of person? If you can tell your own story, you will win.

R.R. Reno critiques the "conservative" case for gay "marriage"

First Things editor R.R. Reno lays out quite clearly the faulty logic behind the arguments for gay "marriage" being embraced by a number of "limited government conservatives."

We’ll hear this argument again and again in the future, so it’s worth taking a close look. The fundamental claim is libertarian: getting the government out of moral questions is a gain for limited government. That seems tautologically true. If the government isn’t telling you whom you can or can’t marry, then the zone of government power contracts and individual freedom expands. But a closer look suggests otherwise.

As Edmund Burke recognized, the form of liberalism that understands liberty as requiring limited government (as opposed to understanding liberty as empowerment, which almost always involves pumping up the power of government as the agent of empowerment) also requires morality, culture, and tradition. That’s a Burkean separation of powers, as it were. Governing power is dispersed rather than concentrated, because morality, culture, and tradition embody independent authorities that shape and order our lives. They’re something the government power must respect rather than superintend, must work around rather than steamroll.

For example, the wrongness of murder and the sanctity of property both limit the scope of government power. The law may specify how to try and punish murder, but government does not invent or define murder. Instead, the law recognizes a moral truth prior to law and politics. That’s why late-term abortions are so scandalous. Nobody is confused about the humanity of the seven-month-old child in the womb, and yet our law refuses to see killing him or her as murder.

Religious truth also limits government, as our Constitution recognizes. Theology is beyond the competence of politics, and for that reason Congress is not to make laws establishing (endorsing) or limiting the free exercise of (condemning) religion. Our religious convictions are practices beyond the purview of politics.

Redefinition of marriage to allow same-sex unions undermines the proper separation of cultural and governmental power that is so important for a liberal regime. Marriage is an institution as fundamental as religion and morality. It is more primitive and ancient than anything resembling organized government. It has varied historically and culturally, of course. But male/female complementarity and its procreative potential is universal, however diverse the forms. Government has always treated marriage like murder—a moral fact recognized rather than a policy formulated, a given truth framed in law rather than something to be fed into the machinery of political debate.

As marriage gets redefined we’ll see an expansion of government. That’s because gay marriage won’t just happen if government “gets out of the way.” It requires creating a new possibility that will not come to pass if traditional institutions and moral traditions are left alone. Government must intervene. Our moral traditions must be subjected to what activists think of as corrective surgery. With gay marriage we’re sure to get legislation redefining what it means to be a parent, and what it means to be a child, as is already the case in California. In the way of these redefinitions will come programs to “reeducate” John Q. Public to the “new realities.”

Here as elsewhere the progressive project is always political. It sees a problem: The pre-political institutions and traditions of society are violating rights and creating inequalities. Then it reaches for the ready tool for redress and correction, which is almost always the power of government—coercive force.

Large government and its threat to freedom aren’t only a matter of size; it’s also a question of the scope of its claim to authority. Gay activists are consistent when they focus on “rights” and “equality,” the first of which must be guaranteed by government coercion, and the second of which must be created by the use of government power. They see that government must intrude. Cultural traditions can’t be allowed to define marriage, because they have done so unjustly. Instead, voters and their representatives must, and failing that, the courts. The political process defines marriage rather than responding to something that can’t be absorbed into the political process.

Tyranny isn’t just a situation in which the government is telling you what to do at every moment. It’s also a society in which government says that, if necessary, it can. In this respect gay marriage reflects a dramatic enlargement of government. If legislatures and courts can redefine marriage, what can’t it intervene to reshape and re-purpose?

Downfall: The desire to be respected in the halls of power

Louie Giglio

Concerning the recent dust-up involving Louie  Giglio's withdrawal from the Obama inauguration ceremony, Gary DeMar asks the question I've been hoping someone would ask before I had to ask it myself. Namely, why would a Christian pastor want to speak a "good word" (i.e. benediction) over an event celebrating a godless political agenda?

Christians are riled up that Louie Giglio, pastor of the Passion City Church in Roswell, Georgia, was dumped by Obama’s people to give the benediction at the President’s inauguration ceremony. I’m shocked that more Christians aren’t riled up that Louie Giglio agreed to do it in the first place.

Don’t get me wrong. I believe Giglio has a great ministry. This year’s Passion event turned out 60,000 young people who donated more than $3 million to help in the effort to abolish the pernicious sin and crime of slavery.

Why was Giglio dumped? I love this from the Washington Post:

“An evangelical pastor from Atlanta announced Thursday [January 10] that he would not give the benediction at President Obama’s swearing-in ceremony after a sermon he gave on homosexuality in the mid-1990s resurfaced earlier this week.

“In that sermon, the Rev. Louie Giglio called for Christians to ‘firmly respond to the aggressive agenda’ of some in the gay community and warns that widespread gay marriage ‘would run the risk of absolutely undermining the whole order of our society.’”

Resurfaced? Did it come ashore in a bottle? It didn’t “resurface.” Homosexual activists went looking for whatever they could find on Giglio to get him ousted. They knew that if they could find anything he said about homosexuality, he would be gone.

President Obama supports homosexual marriage. He’s pushing for a state-wide acceptance of homosexual marriage in his home state of Illinois.

How can a Christian offer a Christian benediction for a man who represents a worldview that is antithetical to the Christian faith he claims to be a part of and implements policies that could result in divine judgment?

Would the apostle Paul have given a benediction for Nero? Would Peter have done it for Herod? Would Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) have given a benediction for Adolf Hitler?! Niemöller used his pulpit to expose Adolf Hitler’s radical politics even though “[h]e knew every word spoken was reported by Nazi spies and secret agents.”

We are to obey the civil authorities. We are to pray for civil rulers to do the right thing (Rom. 13:4; 1 Pet. 2:13). But we are not required to stand up with them and grace their governments with a benediction. How can a “good word” be given for a civil ruler who supports so many

John the Baptist didn’t attend government functions with Herod and sanction his behavior with a benediction. He spoke out against his sin. He paid a heavy price (Mark 6:14-29).

We shouldn’t be surprised at the way Christians and Christian beliefs are dealt with by this administration. We’ve seen four years of it. Early Christians suffered under the religious oppression, first, of Judaism, and second, Imperial Rome. Ours is a prophetic task not an enabling one.

Nathan didn’t stand with King David and offer a benediction. David would have loved for him to do it. It would have given him religious cover for his sins. Instead, Nathan confronted the powerful king about his sin. Keep in mind that David was an accomplice to murder. Nathan put his life on the line in his prophetic word to the king.

The same is true of the priests who confronted King Uzziah (2 Chron. 26:16–23). The king had just “warred against the Philistines, and broke down the wall of Gath and the wall of Jabneh and the wall of Ashdod; and he built cities in the area of Ashdod and among the Philistines” (v. 6). The priests were defenseless, and yet they still confronted the king.

Overstated comparisons with Nero, Hitler, et al. aside, DeMar's point is well taken. The actions of Obama and his administration over the last four years, most notably the suppression of religious freedom through mandates imposed on religious groups via his healthcare law, suggest that the president is, at best, a person of wavering faith more urgently in need of the church's rebuke and correction than its blessing.

Cardinal Dolan

That being said, however, it is possible for a Christian leader to be salt and light while carrying out ceremonial duties at political gatherings. Delivering the benediction at both party conventions this past summer, Timothy Cardinal Dolan, with meticulous pastoral skill, asked God's blessing on the nation and its political process while simultaneously reminding both Democrats and Republicans of the great national sins in which partisans on both sides have been complicit.

Religious celebrities (forgive me for my cynicism) cozying up to presidents is nothing new. Obama has had his share of moderate to left-leaning clerics on the White House guest list, and they have generally served as court theologians for his political agenda. Conversely, the list of "right wing" evangelical clerics who have frequented the White House during the tenures of Republican presidents is infinite, and one would be hard pressed to find any instance of them rebuking their nation's leader in even the mildest tone, much less that of a Nathan or a John the Baptist. The desire to be respected in the halls of power has been, and will continue to be, the downfall of many a Christian leader, regardless of political affiliation, who forgets his first allegiance is to Christ and his kingdom.

Church of England Evangelical Council issues St. Matthias Day Statement affirming biblical teaching on marriage

St Matthias Day Statement

On the 30th November 1995, as the world celebrated St Andrew’s day, under the aegis of the CEEC, a group of British Biblical and moral theologians published a significant and widely welcomed contribution to the then debate on homosexuality within the church. It was received by many as a thoughtful, cogently argued and pastorally sensitive contribution to the discussions, and has been broadly referenced, read and re-read in the seventeen years since it
was first published.

The church’s conversation on the theology and ethics of same sex relationships continues unabated. Sometimes good thinking has been marred by insensitive and occasionally homophobic attitudes. Other times, genuinely compassionate and inclusive attitudes have been weakened by a lack of biblical rigour, and a consequent misreading of the revealed mind of God.

Since 1995 social change, relational practice and ethical thinking within the church have undergone a notable transformation away from orthodox biblical thinking. Parallel to this is an increasingly comprehensive public avowal of homosexual practice greater than in any other time in our church and nation’s history. Now that the government has called for a public debate on same sex marriage, effectively involving a redefinition of marriage itself, the urgency of thoughtful, biblical discussion set in the context of the Anglican formularies, their commitments and hermeneutic is especially pressing.

The Church of England Evangelical Council offers this irenic, finely argued, biblically articulate monograph, set as it is in the rich context of foundational Anglican thinking, to engage all in our church of whatever persuasion. Like its predecessor it is notable for both its rigour and sensitivity, and for this we are deeply thankful for its authors’ humanity and outstanding scholarship. Of course there are other important matters such as equality and human rights that also require thorough biblical thinking and analysis; but before we address such issues, we believe it is important to restate and reaffirm classic, foundational Anglican teaching on this matter.

As a council we pray that engagement with this material will lead to deeper biblical discussion on an issue of great concern to God , and therefore for his church too. For that reason, and in the expectation and prayer for his Spirit’s enablement, we offer to the Anglican Church with its many constituencies, this St Matthias Day Statement.

Michael Lawson
St Matthias Day
14th May 2012

Introduction

The following short statement seeks to help Anglicans understand our church’s teaching in the area of marriage and sexual relationships and its relevance today. It does so by providing a five-fold summary of that teaching based in Scripture and Anglican tradition. This teaching should be our guide if we are to remain faithful in our pastoral, prophetic and missional responsibilities and in our inter-Anglican and ecumenical relationships.

The Church must, like Christ, welcome, love and respect all, particularly those who feel excluded and marginalised such as those who identify as sexual minorities. It must also, like Christ, bear witness to God’s good purposes for humanity and call for repentance, assisting a return to God’s will whenever we depart from these purposes.

Why is this statement of Anglican teaching necessary?

The Church of England’s teaching about marriage and sexual relationships other than marriage currently faces a number of challenges:

• Within British society, attitudes to sexual relationships have changed in recent decades and there are plans to redefine marriage. 

• Within the Anglican Communion, some dioceses and provinces are changing their teaching and practice. 

• Ecumenically, some of our sister churches, notably among the Porvoo churches, are also revising their doctrine and marriage liturgies.

What is the basis of this statement of Anglican teaching?

In the words of the Declaration of Assent, “The Church of England is part of the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, worshipping the one true God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It professes the faith uniquely revealed in the Holy Scriptures and set forth in the catholic creeds, which faith the Church is called upon to proclaim afresh in each generation. Led by the Holy Spirit, it has borne witness to Christian truth in its historic formularies, the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion, The Book of Common Prayer and the Ordering of Bishops, Priests and Deacons”.

Therefore, basing itself on Scripture and these formularies, the statement draws out their significance in this area if in the Church of England we are to express our “loyalty to this inheritance of faith” as “our inspiration and guidance under God” and bring “the grace and truth of Christ to this generation” by making Him known.

What does this statement seek to achieve?

The statement seeks to express Anglican teaching in a way that

• those committed to that teaching will welcome it as a guide and reference as they seek to teach it and live it out, 

• those uncertain about that teaching will find it informative and persuasive and 

• those seeking to revise that teaching will be able to dialogue with it constructively in order to clarify the nature and depth of our differences.

1 – God’s love and call to love


Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
(1 John 4.7)

O Lord, who hast taught us that all our doings without charity are nothing worth: Send thy Holy Ghost, and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of charity, the very bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before thee. Grant this for thine only Son Jesus Christ's sake. Amen. (Collect for Quinquagesima Sunday in the Book of Common Prayer)

1a. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, all Christians are called by God to practise Christian love (or ‘charity’). Although God has called us to love all people everywhere, he has also given us certain key forms of relationship in which we can learn what it means to give and to receive love.

1b. These God-given forms of relationship include relationships between believers, marriage and other family relationships, and committed loving friendships.

1c. The Church is therefore called to affirm and support the value of all such God-given relationships. In a culture which overemphasises sexual relationships and wrongly implies that love and sexual activity necessarily belong together, we must particularly commend the importance of intimate, committed friendships that remain chaste.

2 – God’s Word and Church


The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever. (Isa 40:8)

The Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies and authority in controversies of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain anything contrary to God's word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. (Article XX)

2a. The authority of the Church to decide its own actions is limited by the word of God in Holy Scripture.

2b. The Church is not free to use certain parts of the Bible, such as the commandment to love our neighbours, as a justification for setting aside teaching contained in other parts of the Bible, such as the rejection of same-sex sexual activity.

2c. The Church therefore does not have the authority to introduce any form of marriage that differs from the form of marriage authorised and commended in Holy Scripture or to commend sexual behaviour forbidden by Holy Scripture.

3 - God’s gift of marriage


“Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? (Matt 19:4-5)

For be ye well assured, that so many as are coupled together otherwise than God’s Word doth allow are not joined together by God; neither is their matrimony lawful. (BCP Solemnization of Matrimony)

3a. Marriage as created by God is an exclusive relationship between one man and one woman that is entered into for life and that is intended in normal circumstances to result in the gift of children who are to be brought up to love and serve God. It is given to us by God both as a created institution which benefits all in society (Genesis 2.18-24) and as a relationship which images the relationship between Christ and His Church (Ephesians 5.21-32).

3b. Because marriage is instituted by God, neither the Church nor the state is authorised to re-define it.

3c. A relationship between two men or two women cannot therefore be a marriage and neither the state nor the Church should describe it as such.

4 - God’s grace and call to holiness


As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:26)

Albeit that good works, which are the fruits of faith and follow after justification, cannot put away our sins and endure the severity of God's judgement, yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively faith, insomuch that by them a lively faith may be as evidently known as a tree discerned by the fruit. (Article XII)

4a. The Church is not only called to proclaim the justifying grace of God in Jesus Christ, but also to teach clearly that true faith expresses itself in holy behaviour.

4b. This holiness includes holiness in the area of sexual behaviour: faithfulness within marriage between a man and a woman and abstinence outside marriage.

4c. The Church is therefore not free to affirm or bless any form of sexual activity or sexual relationship outside marriage but should welcome those in such relationships with pastoral care, a call to repentance, and the good news that God gives us the gift of the Holy Spirit to enable us to flourish by living lives that are in accordance with
His call to holiness.

5 - God’s people united in and by God’s word


They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. (Acts 2:42)

The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same. (Article XIX)

5a. The visible Church of Christ is a place where the life-giving and life-changing word of God is faithfully proclaimed.

5b. Redefining marriage to include same-sex relationships or affirming or blessing sexual activity outside marriage is contrary to God’s word.

5c. When a church does either of these things it therefore becomes difficult to recognise it as part of the visible Church of Christ. Consequently such matters fall outside the scope of acceptable ecumenical diversity and are a legitimate ground for division between churches.

Conclusion

Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. (Hebrews 12.14)

We offer this five part statement to Anglican Christians in the hope that, guided and nourished by Scripture and tradition, we may be led together into the way of peace and holiness as we seek to bear faithful witness to the grace and truth of Christ in society and the wider church.

We do so aware that as individuals and as a church we constantly fall short in our understanding and in our obedience.

In this and every area of our discipleship and mission we must, therefore, be constant
in prayer, seeking the grace of God -

O God the strength of all them that put their trust in thee, mercifully accept our prayers; and because through the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing without thee, grant us the help of thy grace, that in keeping thy commandments we may please thee both in will and deed; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (Collect for the First Sunday after Trinity BCP)

CEEC Statement on Marriage – Commendations

“I am very grateful to those who have put together such a clear statement of the traditional and orthodox Anglican position. I warmly commend the statement as an essential contribution to the current debate.”

The Rt Revd Donald Allister

Bishop of Peterborough

“I’m glad to commend this careful restatement of the Anglican norms set out in Scripture, the Book of Common Prayer and our modern liturgical formularies – and expressed succinctly in Canon B30: namely that ‘The Church of England affirms, according to our Lord's teaching, that marriage is in its nature a union permanent and lifelong, for better for worse, till death them do part, of one man with one woman, to the exclusion of all others on either side, for the procreation and nurture of children, for the hallowing and right direction of the natural instincts and affections, and for the mutual society, help and comfort which the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity.’”

The Rt Revd Pete Broadbent

Bishop of Willesden and Deputy Bishop of London

“Alongside the House of Bishops 1999 Teaching document ‘Marriage’ this statement helpfully sets out key reasons for the church sustaining its official teaching on marriage which I fully support.”

The Rt Revd Paul Butler

Bishop of Southwell and Nottingham

“At a time of intense debate and significant friction we welcome this considered statement which clearly comes from people ‘making every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace’.”

The Revd Preb John and Mrs Anne Coles

Leaders of New Wine

“A timely prophetic call to be true to our Anglican identity with respect to marriage, and to offer authentic pastoral support by being faithful to Scripture.”

The Revd Sean Doherty,

Tutor in Ethics, St Mellitus College, London

“At a time of unprecedented assault on the historic biblical understanding of marriage I welcome every strand of support for orthodoxy including this statement from the CEEC.’’

The Revd John Dunnett,

CPAS General Director and Member of General Synod for Chelmsford Diocese

“Eirenic, clear and compelling. The call to prayer and seeking God’s grace is very apposite.”

Dr Philip Giddings

Chairman, House of Laity of the General Synod

“This clear statement properly recognises the primacy of biblical teaching with respect to marriage , and rightly calls Anglicans to reaffirm that teaching. In line with Scripture, our formularies are plain enough on the definition of marriage as a distinctively male-female union, and the statement reaffirms that definition while urging gracious, pastoral and Christ-like interaction with gay and lesbian people. It is both welcome and timely.”

The Revd Dr David Hilborn,

Principal, St. John’s College, Nottingham

“The church's response to the issues surrounding same-sex relationship is often fraught with difficulty. Many are nervous of being seen as bigoted and intolerant if they question moves to bless such relationships or call them marriage. This statement of Anglican teaching on marriage and sexuality will therefore be extremely helpful through its careful but clear witness to the biblical principles of both grace and truth. I have no hesitation in commending it.”

The Revd Stephen Kuhrt

Vicar of Christ Church, New Malden and Chair of Fulcrum

“This is a very helpful and relevant outline of Christian teaching from both the Bible and the historic foundational documents on which our Anglican Communion has been built.”

The Revd Jane Morris

Vicar of St. Gabriel’s, Cricklewood and Member of General Synod for London Diocese

“This is a clear and careful expression of Anglican teaching which should gain wide support. It speaks graciously into the current debate and irenically cuts through much of the ideology and acrimony in the media on this subject.”

The Revd Dr Ian Paul

Dean of Studies, St John’s College, Nottingham

“I commend this concise statement on Christian marriage. Particularly helpful is the grounding in the Prayer Book liturgy and collects which remind us that marriage is not purely private, but also public; not defined by society, but by God through his word; not irrelevant, because true marriage expresses God’s love and is to be received in the context of prayer and worship.”

The Revd Dr Simon Vibert

Vice Principal, Wycliffe Hall, Oxford

“A helpful explanation of the nature of marriage as it has always been understood by the church, and a reminder that the church is not at liberty to exceed the bounds set by Scripture.”

Mrs Alison Wynne

Member of General Synod for Blackburn Diocese

Download statement in .pdf format

BREAKING NEWS: ++Rowan is actually making sense

Hey, give the man credit when he actually does his job!

The law has no right to legalise same-sex marriage, the Archbishop of Canterbury declared yesterday. 

Dr Rowan Williams said a new marriage law for gay couples would amount to forcing unwanted change on the rest of the nation.

He also said it would be wrong to legalise assisted dying because of the threat it would pose to the vulnerable and because it would go against the beliefs of most people.

In a key speech on human rights, the head of the Anglican Church put his weight behind other leading clergy who have launched a powerful campaign to prevent David Cameron from going ahead with his plan to allow the full rights of marriage to same-sex couples.

Dr Williams’s predecessor in Lambeth Palace, Lord Carey, notably told the Mail last week that same-sex marriage laws would be ‘one of the greatest political power grabs in history’.

Dr Williams’s statement means the Prime Minister now knows he will face opposition from the liberal-minded leadership of the Church of England – as well as its determined traditionalists – if he continues on the track towards legalised gay marriage.

The Archbishop said human rights law ‘falls short of a legal charter to promote change in institutions’.

Dr Williams added: ‘If it is said that a failure to legalise assisted suicide – or same-sex marriage – perpetuates stigma or marginalisation for some people, the reply must be, I believe, that issues like stigma and marginalisation have to be addressed at the level of culture rather than law.’

The Archbishop indicated to MPs earlier this week that CofE churches would never be used to solemnise gay marriages and Anglican officials underlined that the Church says marriage must remain a union between a man and a woman.

Dr Williams’s intervention in the argument yesterday, in a speech to a World Council of Churches gathering in Geneva, echoed, in typically mild academic language, the sentiments expressed by Lord Carey.

The Archbishop has long been a personal supporter of gay rights and his lecture yesterday insisted Christians must accept that gay equality laws are here to stay.

But he has also listened to the concerns of traditional Christian believers since he began his career at Lambeth Palace in 2003 by refusing to allow an openly gay cleric to take a post as a CofE bishop.

His remarks yesterday came after Coalition ministers insisted they would go ahead with a same-sex marriage law whatever the churches say.

Equality minister Lynne Featherstone said last week the churches did not own marriage law. She added a same-sex marriage law would be ‘about the underlying principles of family, society and personal freedoms’.

Mr Cameron declared for same-sex marriage last autumn, saying: ‘Conservatives believe in the ties that bind us; that society is stronger when we make vows to each other and support each other.

‘I don’t support gay marriage in spite of being a Conservative. I support gay marriage because I am a Conservative.’
A consultation document on how a gay marriage law would work is due out shortly.

Dr Williams said in his speech that same-sex marriage law was wrong because it tried to impose cultural change.

He added human rights language could be ‘confused and artificial’ when it strayed from protecting the vulnerable. It could become ‘an alien culture, pressing the imperatives of universal equality over all local custom and affinity’.

The sad legacy of Resolution 15

Bishops seated at the 1930 Lambeth Conference

In light of the recent assault on religious liberty by the Obama Administration, specifically its bullheaded refusal to allow educational and charitable agencies of the Catholic Church conscientious exemptions from health insurance mandates regarding contraceptive and abortifacient drugs, it is prudent at this time to revisit a fateful resolution adopted by the bishops of the Anglican Communion at the 1930 Lambeth Conference.

Resolution 15 addressed The Life and Witness of the Christian Community - Marriage and Sex. It read as follows (emphasis added):

Where there is clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood, the method must be decided on Christian principles. The primary and obvious method is complete abstinence from intercourse (as far as may be necessary) in a life of discipline and self-control lived in the power of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless in those cases where there is such a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood, and where there is a morally sound reason for avoiding complete abstinence, the Conference agrees that other methods may be used, provided that this is done in the light of the same Christian principles. The Conference records its strong condemnation of the use of any methods of conception control from motives of selfishness, luxury, or mere convenience.

As the late Peter Toon noted in a 2008 essay, this resolution represented a radical departure from what had been, up to that time, an undisputed ecumenical consensus and codified throughout the Anglican Communion a novel teaching on artificial birth control which has yet to be refuted by any national or regional body.

In the Early Church, in the Medieval Church, in the Churches of the Protestant Reformation and in the Christian tradition to the 1920s (e.g., see the Marriage Service in The BCP 1662), any form of artificial birth control in order to make the sexual act sterile was regarded as a serious sin against God’s holy law. In 1930 the Anglican Council of Bishops, for what seemed to be good pastoral reasons, suggested ways for Christian couples in certain circumstances to reject this law.  

By this Resolution, which went around the world like wild-fire, the Anglican Way was changed permanently. No attempt has been made in any Lambeth Conference since 1930 to reverse it, and no national or regional synod of the Anglican Communion has officially rejected it. Thus it stands as part of the modern, Anglican teaching on sexual relations within marriage.

The sad legacy of Resolution 15 has been the disintegration of the Anglican Communion, at first gradual, but accelerated in the past few decades by the schismatic practices of its most liberal provinces in North America and the British Isles and, most recently, by the rebellious actions of the indigenous leaders of once promising missionary jurisdictions. The fact that it probably comes as a surprise to even the most conservative of Anglicans in America and Britain that the change in the Communion's teaching on contraception came so relatively recently, and that the present teaching is alien to Reformed, as well as Catholic, tradition ought to be evidence enough that the depth of our troubles is far greater than we had first thought. Indeed, the innovations of the more recent past are merely the inevitable metastasis of a malignant tumor which first invaded the body in 1930.

OWS: Anatomy of a self-centered illusion

The "Occupy Wall Street" (OWS) crowd is a sorry, pathetic lot for whom common decency and proper hygiene are strangers. The persistence with which the media continue to inflict coverage of this fringe movement upon the wider reading and viewing public says much more about the sympathies of ostensibly professional journalists than it does about the social and political significance of the "occupiers." A recent study by Frontier Lab, summarized in a column by Charles C.W. Cook, revealed the self-centered motivations behind both the "rank and file" and the "leadership" of the movement.

Occupy Wall Street’s surface message, cleverly backed up with the canny but fatuous “99%” slogan, is an illusion, a red herring employed in a cynical attempt to press more mainstream public unease into the service of a worldview that remains very much on the fringe. Were all of OWS’s gripes to be resolved firmly in their favor, the displeased would not suddenly consider America pure. On the contrary, by and large, the types who have occupied Zuccotti and other parks across the nation consider the United States to be an intractably racist, imperialist, unequal nation, which boasts an invidious history whose alleged crimes can be seen populating the pages of Howard Zinn’s books. As a new report concludes, “while their rhetoric might decry crony capitalism or bank bailouts, their values reveal self-centered and fear-based motivations,” and a deep hostility to capitalism and American values of individualism and limited government is thrown in for good measure.

The report, Shortselling America, reveals that, below the surface, there is a lot more going on than meets the eye, and most of it has very little to do with “social justice.” Its author, Frontier Lab takes an interesting approach, applying techniques of market research to political science. The group’s aim is to move away from the short-term model employed by political pollsters — which, although valuable, essentially provides just a fleeting snapshot — and instead to conduct a more thorough assessment of participants’ values. From these data, they then seek to predict future behavior. An example: Surface-level polling will see consumers tell us that the reason they buy a particular dish soap is because it is green, or cheap, or conveniently sized. But research shows the deeper truth is that, overwhelmingly, people buy the same brand as their mother did. (Nobody will write that on a survey.)

What did Frontier Lab discover? First, that many of the rank-and-file occupiers feel isolated in their lives, and appear to lack basic community ties such as are provided by participation in clubs, churches, and strong families. Indeed, much of the report could have come from the early chapters of Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone. They thus attach to their political causes with something like a religious fervor. For many, a commitment to “social justice” is “not the end, but rather a means to an inflated sense of self and purpose in their own lives.” Crucially, involvement with others who agree with them provides an “overwhelming feeling of being part of a family.” I noticed this on my first trip down to Zuccotti Park, when I saw a telling sign adorning the entrance to the tent city: “For the first time in my life, I feel at home.” On subsequent visits I was struck by the importance of the commune to the project. As much as anything else, vast swathes of occupiers were simply looking for a new club. This group, Frontier Lab dubs the “Communitarians.”

The second group, which to all intents and purposes forms the leadership, is less existentially lost, and derives its fulfillment from the “prestige,” “validation,” and “control” afforded by the movement’s coverage in the media. Frontier Lab calls this group the “Professionals.” Its members fill the ranks of the professional Left and boast long histories of attending and organizing protests. For them, indignation is quotidian, “community action” is a career, and they feel “validated by the fame and attention” and “rewarded for their life choices.” Unlike the Communitarians, the Professionals actually want tangible change, or a “win,” but politics is still playing second fiddle to self. There is nothing spontaneous or organic about the movements they lead. They are waiting for the revolution and hope to be in its vanguard. Their careers depend upon it.

Cynicism about the movement can easily creep in when information like this is taken into consideration. Such an attitude, however, would be taking the easy way out. While the "Professionals" may be far gone, there is still hope for the "Communitarians."

So, what can be done? While the report unhappily concludes that “the Occupy path directly opposes fundamental American values of freedom, equality of opportunity, and individual responsibility,” Anne Sorock of Frontier Lab does not consider the occupiers a lost cause, at least not the Communitarian strand. “It is important not to write them off,” she told me. It is true that “they do not resonate to words such as ‘freedom’ or to abstract notions of individualism,” nor are they likely to be convinced by argument about the issues. But, “given what we consider to be the root of the problem, they can be addressed,” firstly, by tackling the lack of social involvement, and secondly by demonstrating how freedom can work for them.

My experience with Occupy was anecdotal, and my observations came from speaking with those involved and watching their behavior. It didn’t take much to see that the disdain felt toward the United States was deep-seated, easily transcending the two or three problems that OWS picked to explain its presence. The disconnect between the alleged gripes and the reality means that there is very little that government can do to change the minds of the occupiers, save for dissolving itself and allowing them to recast the dye. But, if Frontier Lab is correct, perhaps we can: By continuing to demonstrate the virtues of the American model for all people, and providing an alternative community for those who feel disconnected, we can turn the attentions and efforts of those who would undo our way of life to something altogether more positive.

This sounds like a task best carried out by the church. What better place to teach a wandering band of deluded "occupiers" what it means to be formed in community and find direction by looking upward to something, or Someone, larger than themselves?

Lectionary help for those who dare to go there

Dennis Babish from Breakpoint cites this week's Gospel text in his essay on a Christian response to the "Occupy Wall Street" movement.

How should a Christian respond to all of this? Are the protestors right, and should we support them? Or does God call us in a different direction?

Eric Metaxas points us to how God defines success. He tells us how Bonhoeffer came to realize that "God was not interested in success, but in obedience. If one obeyed God and was willing to suffer defeat and whatever else came one's way, God would show a kind of success that the world couldn't imagine."

God is telling us that success is not based on what car we drive, or size of house we live in, or even how much wealth we have accumulated over our lives. It is based, rather, on our obedience to His Word and the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

He shows us this through Christ's life, death, and resurrection. Jesus was always obedient to His Father's commands. By the world's standards Jesus was a failure and should be ignored, but through His obedience He attained the ultimate success and now sits at the right hand of the Father.

As Christians we should value obedience to Jesus over any worldly success. We should also recognize that every good thing we have comes from God, and not for our sole benefit but so that we can use it all to glorify Him.

Which leads me to my final point. What the protestors are promoting is what the Bible would call covetousness. There really isn't any such thing as "haves" and "have-nots." We all are "haves." If you read the parable of the talents, you will notice two things. First, each servant was given a different amount, not equally divided, and commanded to manage what they were given. God is not showing favorites. He gives us all different amounts of wealth, intelligence, creativity, and so forth, and commands us to manage what He has given us to His glory, not for our worldly success.

We also see that when the master returned and asked for an accounting from each, he didn't take from the two that were successful and give to the one that was lazy. Rather, he condemned the lazy one for not doing anything. He then took away the talents the lazy one had and gave it to the two that had much, and said: "For whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." (Matthew 25:29-30)

Let none of us Christians be found, when Jesus returns, to be like the lazy one, not applying what we have been given. Let us not be among those who are demanding that we be given what God has given others. Instead let us be found content with what God has given us, actively obeying His Word and multiplying our talents for His glory.

There is some interesting preaching material for any who would dare to go there. However, as I am a stickler for interpretive accuracy, I don't like to rush into contemporary applications of ancient parables without a little historical background. N.T. Wright (Matthew for Everyone, Part Two, pp. 137-139) gives us some perspective.

The normal way of taking [the parable] is to suggest that Jesus is preparing the disciples for quite a long period during which he will not be present, and will have left them tasks to be getting on with. On his return they will be judged according to how they have performed. That, of course, can easily collapse into the "examination-system" understanding of Christianity once more. It doesn't have to, but it easily could.

But the real problem with it is that a story about a master and slaves, in which the master goes away leaving the slaves tasks to perform and then comes back at last, would certainly be understood, in the Judaism of Jesus' day, as a story about God and Israel. This is certainly how Luke intends us to understand the very similar story in his gospel (19.11-27). And if, as I've suggested all along, both the Sermon on the Mount and this final great discourse in Matthew's gospel are to be seen first and foremost as Jesus' challenge to his own day and the days immediately following, perhaps we should take this parable in the same way.

It then belongs closely with Matthew 23, where Jesus denounces the scribes and Pharisees. They, we may suggest, are represented by the wicked servant who hid his master's money. (A "talent", by the way, was a unit of money, worth roughly what a labourer could earn in 15 years. Our modern word "talent", in the sense of the gifts or skills that an individual possesses, is derived from this, precisely because of this parable.) In what sense had they been given something that corresponds to the gift of the talent?

The scribes and the Pharisees had been given the law of Moses. They had been given the Temple, the sign of God's presence among them. They had been given wonderful promises about how God would bless not only Israel but, through Israel, the whole world. And they had buried them in the ground. They had turned the command to be the light of the world into an encouragement to keep the light for themselves (5.14-16). They had been worthless slaves. And now, when their master was at last coming back, he was going to call them to account. The threatened destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple was to be seen as the master's punishment on the servant who had not done his will.

The emphasis of the parable falls, again and again, on this third slave, the one whose folly fails to respond to the master's generosity. Who then are the other two, those who respond appropriately to the master's trust?

They are, it seems, those who hear the call of Jesus and, on that basis, develop what Israel has already been given so that it now becomes something new. They are like the mustard seed in 13.31-32, which starts small and then grows large. They are the signs that God's kingdom is starting to bud and blossom. And now, when Jesus has come to Jerusalem to force the final confrontation between God's kingdom and the system that had resisted and opposed it -- then those who are loyal to him will be like those who have made wise use of the money that had been entrusted to them.

This setting means that any sense of a "final examination" is placed within a larger context, in which the grace and love of God are overflowing at every point. Yes, God does indeed long for people to use wisely the gifts they have been given. Yes, God did indeed come, in the person of the Emmanuel, Jesus the Messiah, to find out who within his chosen people had used profitably the blessings he had showered upon them. And, yes, once we have said this we can perfectly reasonably say, in line with the whole New Testament, that God will, still through the person of Jesus, sift and weigh everything that Christians do in the present life (see particularly 1 Corinthians 3.10-15; 2 Corinthians 5.10). All this is important and cannot be ignored.

But we must also, and always, insist that this parable and others like it do not give a complete picture of the creator God, the maker and lover of the world, the God who sent Jesus as the personal expression of his love. Remember where this parable occurs. It comes near the end of a story which is about to reach its great climax; and that climax comes when the son of man "gives his life as a ransom for many" (20.28). When Jesus speaks of someone being thrown into the darkness outside, where people weep and grind their teeth, we must never forget that he was himself on the way into the darkness, where even he would sense himself abandoned by God (27.45-46).

"How would Jesus vote?" and other stupid questions

Charles M. Sheldon's novel In His Steps, first published in 1896, proposed the idea of asking the question, "What would Jesus do?" when facing moral and ethical decisions. Over the years, there have been numerous variations on this basic theme. Some have been helpful, to a certain extent. Others have been less so, to a greater extent.

Several years ago, a group of environmentally-minded evangelicals came in for some justified ridicule when they embarked on a campaign to encourage "responsible" choices in automobiles with the question, "What would Jesus drive?" Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, traversed the Judean countryside primarily on foot, and was known to walk across large bodies of water before hopping into a small boat. Automobiles were not a part of the first century world in which he lived. To imply, as this particular group did, that driving an SUV is somehow less Christ-like than driving a Kia was a stupefying display of spiritual hubris. As one critic whimsically pointed out, Jesus would have been much better off traveling with his twelve disciples in one SUV than in a caravan of three or four compact cars.

This comical example of the "What would Jesus do?" principle illustrates the danger in carrying that principle too far. It is one thing to be confronted with a personal moral or ethical dilemma and seek prayerfully to discern how Jesus would have one respond. It is quite another to presume to speak for Jesus in a way which fits one's personal political agenda, particularly when the issue in question has no clear parallel with the actual historical period during which Jesus walked the earth. An even more illustrative, and politically charged, variation on the theme is the often asked question, "How would Jesus vote?"

Where does one begin to dissect the theological, historical, and Christological ignorance inherent in such a question? One is asked to assume, for the moment, that Jesus is a 21st century American living in a representative republic, rather than a first century Middle Eastern Jew living under the subjugation of a Roman imperial autocrat. Participatory democracy was not a part of the world in which Jesus lived. It may well be, however, a consequence of the world he changed forever through his life, death, and resurrection. The historical, geographical, social, and political setting of Jesus' first advent was no mere happenstance. It was an integral part of God's redemptive plan. Had Jesus not come in the flesh as a first century Middle Eastern Jew, there would be no 21st century America. From all indications, the human race as a whole would have wiped itself out centuries ago, long before anyone would have thought to put the issue to a vote.

The point here is not to question the propriety of applying one's faith to questions of politics, morals, or ethics. It is, rather, to caution against carrying an elementary principle too far. Sheldon's original version of the question, on the surface, did provide a practical way of applying the Christian faith in all of life's circumstances. But, beneath that surface, it illustrated Sheldon's elevated view of Jesus as moral example and his diminished view of Jesus as Savior and Redeemer. Present-day variations on the theme, likewise, tend to reflect a low Christology and an ahistorical understanding of Jesus' redemptive work.

Christians for a Sustainable Economy make their CASE

David French introduces a new coalition to counter the Religious Left on economic issues. I'd say it's about time the claims of Jim Wallis and company were openly challenged.

Over the past several weeks I’ve been writing about the religious Left’s relentless effort to wrap its arms around big government and, disturbingly, the progress it’s making in divorcing evangelicals (especially young evangelicals) from fiscal and economic common sense. Jim Wallis and other religious leftists have formed a so-called “Circle of Protection” whose purpose is to ask, “What would Jesus cut?” This coalition — which gained an audience with President Obama two weeks ago — views federal budgeting practices that would ruin households, corporations, and local and state governments as not just fiscally appropriate but morally imperative.

The time has come to push back, to let the president and the public know that the religious Left does not speak for the entire faith community and that there is another relevant question to ask as we face a deficit crisis: “Whom would Jesus indebt?” I — along with my ACLJ colleague Jordan Sekulow — have joined an informal coalition of Christian leaders called “Christians for a Sustainable Economy.” As our first act, we’ve sent our own letter to President Obama. It begins:

Recently, in the midst of the debt-ceiling crisis, a group calling themselves the “Circle of Protection,” led by Jim Wallis of the activist group Sojourners, met with you and your staff to claim that biblical mandates preclude limits to federal programs for low-income people. The Circle includes representatives of the National Association of Evangelicals, Bread for the World, and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Wallis and the “Circle of Protection” do not speak for all Christians. However laudable their intentions, the consequence of their action is to provide a religious imprimatur for big government and sanctify federal welfare programs that are often ineffective — even counterproductive. Contrary to their founding “Statement,” we do not need to “protect programs for the poor.” We need to protect the poor themselves. Indeed, sometimes we need to protect them from the very programs that ostensibly serve the poor, but actually demean the poor, undermine their family structures and trap them in poverty, dependency and despair for generations. Such programs are unwise, uncompassionate, and unjust.

The answer is not higher taxes and more government spending:

The debt disaster is a spending issue. Tax revenues are finite, while the growth of government is unceasing. By any measure, federal spending has skyrocketed, from $2.9 trillion in 2008 to $3.8 trillion in 2011. We presently borrow over forty cents of every dollar we spend. While increasing taxes will generate additional revenues and reduce the deficit in the short term, it will ultimately harm the economy, constrain economic growth, and hasten the out-of-control growth of government. To give more money to Washington is to give the sickness the remedy it requests. The last thing the government needs is more money. It needs to cease its unwise and profligate spending.

And what is the true moral imperative? The letter puts its well:

We believe the poor of this generation and generations to come are best served by policies that promote economic freedom and growth, that encourage productivity and creativity in every able person, and that wisely steward our common resources for generations to come.

The letter represents just one step in a long battle to educate Americans — of all faiths — that the poor are not best served by welfare and that hundreds of billions of dollars of Great Society entitlements have not eradicated poverty but have instead created a permanent underclass and stifled the social mobility that is one of the cornerstones of the American dream. You can sign the letter as well and lend your voice to a new and vital effort.

Does a constructive Christian response to the debt crisis begin with tithing?

Jordan J. Ballor is not impressed with even the most valiant attempts to produce a Christian response to the debt crisis. But he does offer a very constructive alternative.

A truly constructive approach to the public debt crisis would outline the various responsibilities of government at various levels, with relative priority for each responsibility. This would help us address the question of whether spending on national defense is more germane to the role of the federal government than providing bed nets to fight malaria in Africa, or whether and to what extent the federal government has a role to play in providing things like medical insurance, infant formula, and public education to its citizens. Only on the basis of these first principles of government can we start to judge how current, as well as past and future, levels of expenditure line up against what government is supposed to do. We can then begin to determine what government has been doing versus what it ought to be doing.

Things that are not properly the task of the federal government might then begin to be privatized with appropriate institutions of civil society or localized to other levels of government. Privatization might be done over time and in an orderly fashion, as federal funding is phased out and private partners are formed, incentivized, or empowered to relieve the government of its responsibilities. Localization would have the advantage of compelling lower levels of government to raise funds for their own programs, rather than routing them through the federal level, and therefore keep the cost of government more transparent and accountable to its constituencies. While privatization and localization will not always be the appropriate solution, such efforts can often advance the Christian social principle of subsidiarity, which emphasizes the sovereignty and legitimacy of the responsibilities of lower and decentralized forms of organization and social life.

There are at least two basic threats that undermine the viability of such an approach, however, and they come from the government and the church, respectively. From the government there is an increasingly disturbing trend that locates the solution to social problems simply either in business or in government. The logic of this either/or mentality places us between market and state, restricting the vitality and independence of mediating institutions, particularly private charities. We see this mentality manifest itself in attacks on charities on a number of fronts, including the rhetorical conflation of “non-profit” with government, the looming decertification of more than a 300,000 charities by the IRS, and newly proposed limits to charitable deductions.

Even more troubling is the mounting evidence that Christians have adopted this mentality, too. We see this in giving patterns among American Christians. The majority of evangelical church leaders, for instance, seem not to think that tithing is a biblical imperative (estimates for levels of evangelical giving typically range from 2 to 4 percent of income). As Ron Sider himself put it, “If American Christians simply gave a tithe rather than the current one-quarter of a tithe, there would be enough private Christian dollars to provide basic health care and education to all the poor of the earth. And we would still have an extra $60-70 billion left over for evangelism around the world.” 

The problem with the CPJ/ESA Call and the host of other Christian responses to the budget crisis is that they do not embody the urgency or the significance of this charitable responsibility. Douglas LeBlanc, author of Tithing: Test Me in This, recently described the importance of tithing as “the beginning of breaking out of that self-indulgent life, primarily because it says to you that your money is not your own. And it’s a small sacramental way of saying that your money in your life is coming to you through the grace of God, through the gifts that He’s given you.”

C. S. Lewis once said, “If you are on the wrong road, progress means doing an about turn and walking back to the right road; and in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive man.” The federal government has been on the wrong road for decades, and the answer to the public debt crisis in America lies in turning back to basic questions about the role of government in its various forms and its relationship to other aspects of social life. A truly Christian response to the challenge of intergenerational justice and the public debt crisis demands no less.

Cizik Watch: Richard, you are in serious peril of losing your soul

The leftward slide of Richard Cizik, former vice president for governmental affairs for the National Association of Evangelicals, has been chronicled here before. Having left a permanent scar on the NAE's commitment to sanctity of life issues (among others), Cizik has moved on to bigger and better things as the liberal media's favorite "evangelical," being ready in season and out to offer his unique perspective on controversial issues.

But Cizik's fall from grace is a serious matter which ought to be of grave concern to believers. Reading his latest collaboration with the forces of cultural accommodation, a Washington Post editorial co-authored with Unitarian-Universalist minister Debra Haffner, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Cizik has completely sold out his convictions in exchange for the adulation of the media and the favor of a rancid, decaying, and morally corrupt American religious establishment.

As religious leaders, we are both called to respond to the needs of the most marginalized, the most vulnerable, and the most likely to be excluded. Both of our organizations are committed to Goal Five of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals, calling for improved global maternal health by reducing maternal mortality by three quarters and achieving universal access to reproductive health. Both of us are committed to helping create a just and equitable world where no woman will die giving birth to the next generation.

Although we hold differing moral values about abortion, we share a commitment that because life is sacred, it should never be created carelessly or unintentionally. That is why we both support the Title X family planning program, which helps avert nearly one million pregnancies in the United States annually. That is why we have a shared belief in international family planning programs, because we know that maternal mortality around the world could be reduced by more than 70 percent by improved access to reproductive health services. We support domestic and international family planning because we know it reduces neonatal and maternal morbidity and mortality, including deaths attributable to unsafe abortions--and it helps build strong families and lives.

As religious leaders, we are called to improve women's and children's lives. It is simply inconceivable to either of us that those who oppose abortion services also have voted to cut or eliminate family planning, prenatal care, mother and infant nutrition programs, and community health services. We stand together in calling on people of faith across the religious spectrum to stand up for the needs of low-income families and their children. We are pro-faith, pro-family, and pro-child.

As people of faith, we call on the U.S. Senate to reject the draconian and ultimately immoral cuts proposed by the U.S. House of Representatives. As religious leaders called by God to co-create a better world where all may flourish and thrive, we can do no less.

Richard, you are in serious peril of losing your soul. Repent and return to the faith you once professed.

The new face of the Culture of Death?

The Culture of Death in the United States, given legal sanction by the Supreme Court's infamous Roe v. Wade decision thirty-eight years ago, has a new face with which it can be associated. It is that of Dr. Kermit Gosnell, a Pennsylvania abortion practitioner who carried that abominable piece of tortured legal reasoning to its logical outcome.

Over the years, Gosnell specialized more and more in late-term abortions, and his preferred method in cases of the most advanced pregnancies was to induce labor in the women who came to him. What resulted in hundreds of cases was a live birth. And thus the issue that has garnered the most attention to the Gosnell case: The doctor is charged with murdering seven babies born alive in his clinic, whom he, or one of his staff under his direction, killed in the first minutes of their post-natal lives by “snipping” their spinal cords (that was the doctor’s own word for it) with scissors at the neck. The grand jury is morally certain there were many hundreds of “snipping” victims, but these seven are the only ones of whose deaths there is solid evidence today.

The women who came to Gosnell’s clinic — poor and desperate, late in their pregnancies, and willing for whatever reason to endure the horrors of his ministrations — wanted to be rid of their babies. This result he provided them. But it is difficult to locate the moral difference between the deaths Gosnell brought about in utero and those he accomplished post-natally. Does an unborn child at 26 weeks of fetal development have less moral standing than a born child at 25 weeks of fetal development? Does the latter’s living and breathing outside the womb for ten minutes, or ten seconds, confer a status that the former lacks? How can that be? 

This is the absurd moral corner into which the Supreme Court backed us in 1973. Not that it bothered Dr. Gosnell. He was in the getting-rid-of-babies business, and no one was going to be sent home with a live one. Viewed in a coldly rational light, the doctor’s logic was admirably consistent: before birth, after birth, it made no difference.

In Roe, the Court’s majority opinion by Justice Harry Blackmun assured readers that in the late stages of pregnancy, when a fetus was “viable” and thus a live birth was possible, the state could prohibit abortion entirely. Except not really entirely: Blackmun carved out an exception where an abortion “is necessary, in appropriate medical judgment, for the preservation of the life or health of the mother.”

This seems a minor and reasonable exception. But in the companion case of Doe v. Bolton, decided the same day, Blackmun wrote for the Court that in determining what is “necessary” for the “health” of a pregnant woman seeking an abortion, a physician’s “medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors — physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age — relevant to the wellbeing of the patient.” Such broad language resulted, in practice, in the total elimination of the state’s power to prohibit post-viability abortions, not just a narrow exception to that power. All that is required to defeat any attempted prohibition is a woman who desires an abortion and a doctor who wishes to provide one. The pregnant woman’s emotional health or familial situation can always be cited afterward, if need be, as a complete and perfect defense.

This is how America’s regime of abortion on demand came about. Since 1973, states have been powerless to prosecute an abortion at any stage of pregnancy, if the charge is merely that the procedure was undertaken too late, or after viability. Thanks to Doe, prosecutors have simply desisted from bringing criminal cases on such a basis. And unscrupulous doctors have been licensed to kill viable unborn children. Hundreds, if not thousands, are aborted every year.

This is the legacy of Roe and Doe. A culture which had been rooted in respect for the sanctity of every human life has been unhinged from its moral moorings and cast adrift in a sea of moral relativism which not only elevates the value of one life over another but also celebrates the destruction of the less valued life as an exercise of a person's "fundamental rights." It is a despicable legacy of death, slaughter, and bloodshed. But while the Gosnell case puts his particular abortion practice in the spotlight, he is undoubtedly not the only one.