The NBC News show “Today” has become a hotbed of journalistic bias and bombast. Gay fashion designers Dolce and Gabbana (a former gay couple) have expressed view so politically incorrect as to offend fellow gay man Elton John and the man he married. These two had the nerve to say that children need a mother and a father, and that children produced by invitro- fertilizization are “chemical” children.Big deal? “Chemical” is a bit extreme, and almost a pejorative. So Elton John has called for us to boycott these businessmen for their opinions. Big deal? Eh.
WHAT IS a big deal is that pressed for their views I am quite of the opinion that both these couples would support a “woman’s right to choose” to murder her unborn baby! Folks, it is time to stop crimes of many kinds and tolerate spoken opinions which offend our ears. Speech is a not crime until some one suffers physical injury or property damage as a result. Getting your feelings hurt is not to suffer a crime. Hurting someone else’s feelings is not a crime. Abortion is a crime because it deprives a person of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Abortion is a crime because those who choose and perform it actually cause damage, and the taking of life is irreparable.
It seems to me so very evil to recommend a boycott against someone because they hurt your feelings. But… we should be free to do business with those we choose! Of course on the other side of the coin we ought to be able to refuse the hire of those we don’t want to work for! Gay people are suing those who are refusing to work for them, notably straight people with religious convictions.
But what is so very sad is the childish behavior of the Today show hosts in reporting this story and others like it. Never has whining around breakfast time been so public, or so off base.
We also see the fallout from a fraternity house bus ride in which a truly unsavory expression of the perjorative : “nigger” was used. Although it is a word that shows a great insensitivity to people of African origin, there are equally offensive words used for people of almost all origins, among them “spic,” “honky,” “gook,” … it would be a long list to try to complete. The odd think is that in many places the n word is used by people of African origin! They can say it but others can’t? I’m not for using it at all. But I’m also not for making the use of it a crime, especially if some are allowed to use it. Any use of thet word is inflammatory. When a “black” man or woman uses the word it inflames the memory of all manner of crimes against people.
There must come a time when we refuse to remember in bitterness crime committed against our fathers or by our fathers against each other. Not to forgive and forget simply keeps an evil fire burning, and ignites that fire in the hearts of the generations to come.
Stick and stones do break bones. Words do not. But words are often and regrettably hurtful. Too often they are spoken and hurtful without regret. We have all said something that hurt someone’s feelings, we have all heard something that hurt our feelings. But should my hurt feelings justify some revenge on another for his unkind words? Speech may be provoking and inflammatory, but I can refuse to be inflamed and provoked. I can choose to ignore or even to forgive, and even to forget. I hope that many others have forgiven and forgotten the stupid things I have said.
When people choose to act against those who offend them criminally, for those troubles we have the law, the courts and the police.
The truth is we have all been offended and we have all offended others. We don’t often embrace truth instantly, sometimes we resist it until it overwhelms us. The truth is that Elton John offends many people who don’t share his politics and social/cultural choices. Should those offended boycott him? Should I boycott NBC Today?
Monday, March 16, 2015
Saturday, March 14, 2015
Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”
Jesus, the DIVINE Son of God is the
foundation of faith and the Author of Salvation. He is the Messiah, the
Anointed One, the Son of the Living God. The Jews cannot be saved apart from Jesus
and faith in Him. Nor can Muslims. God will be honored and glorified in Jesus
and as Jesus or it will not be God who is honored and glorified. THAT is the
essential fact which excludes all other so called gods and faiths from God's
saving grace!
Religions have always been know to
be exclusionary, none more so than Christianity. But today the rise of
syncretism and one world religious faith teaches erroneously that it does not
matter what you call and name as God. Thereby people teach falsely and believe
falsely that Allah is God. Or that Jehovah minus Jesus is God. The God of
Abraham is fully revealed in the New Testament. A very powerful example of this
is found at the baptism of Jesus in the following verses:
Luke 3
21 Now it came to pass, when all the
people were baptized, that, Jesus also having been baptized, and praying, the
heaven was opened,
22 and the Holy Spirit descended in
a bodily form, as a dove, upon him, and a voice came out of heaven, Thou art my
beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.
Clearly we hear the Father and see
the Holy Spirit (the dove) as Jesus, God the Son, the Lord of all and Savior of
those who believe is baptized.
John 1:17
...the law was given through Moses;
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
John 14:6
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way,
and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father, but by me.
I pray you not be as Pilate who
famously asked, "What is truth?"
The quintessential RIGHT
John 1:12
"But as many as received him,
to them gave he the right to become children of God, even to them that believe
on his name:"
The right to become children of God
is a right without which one remains a child of the devil. One can suffer
inhumanity for his entire life but go to heaven by exercising this right of
receiving and believing Jesus the Messiah. Or one can have the respect and
comfort of every human being on earth all their life and go to hell by refusing
to believe in the Name of Jesus. For that reason I say (with some small
hyperbole) that by receiving and believing Jesus, the right to become children
of God is the ONLY right that matters.
IF WE ACTUALLY were more committed
to treating others as we wish they would treat us, God would be delighted. But
as sinners saved by grace, I fear God frowns on us as we demand others treat us
according to some innate human dignity that passed from view when Adam sinned.
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