Freedom for All, If. . .

It seems to me (and I’ve only been closely watching the political and cultural climate for about 10 years now) that this is an incredibly hostile atmosphere for freedom to survive in long-term.  It is under attack from every angle, and I’m not taking about our War on Terror (oh, excuse me, our Overseas Contingency Operations).  I’ve noticed that at an alarming rate, our freedoms as conservative, Christian, traditional men, women and children are in grave danger.  There is a growing group out there (that includes the mainstream media) that wants to believe that the U.S. Constitution does not protect us “right-wing extremists.”  They are doing everything in their power (never underestimate that power, by the way) to selectively strip away freedom from a majority.  In their world, freedom is only “for all” if. . .

. . .If you are not a born-again Christian (unless you are willing to keep your mouth shut about it)

. . .If you are not a conservative 

. . .If you are not trying to keep marriage traditionally defined, between one man and one woman

. . .If you are not Carrie Prejean, for example

. . .If you are not for smaller government and less taxes

. . .If you didn’t attend a Tax Day Tea Party

. . .If tolerance is your god

. . .If you aren’t fighting to overturn Roe v. Wade

. . .If the DNC or MoveOn.org received contributions from you in the last 8 years

. . .If you hate George W. Bush more than any other individual on this earth

. . .If you are a pacifist

. . .If you are in adamant denial of the existence of absolute truth

. . .If you are ok with radical, liberal, activist judges legislating from the bench

. . .If you want to stay ignorant about what the Founding Fathers actually set in motion for this country

. . .If you boycott the Fox News Channel

But I don’t fit the mold on any of those things, therefore, my rights and freedoms are in jeopardy.  The Bible says that many scary things will happen in the end times, and although I have no idea if the “end times” are 10 years away or 1,000, I do know that this world is not my home (Ephesians 3:20) and I rejoice in my eternal destination.  At the same time, I know that while I am here, I can gently and lovingly stand on the truth of the Word of God and fight to preserve what the Founding Fathers (and our Heavenly Father) intended this great nation to be, and I can do it without apology.  And I have a feeling that those who feel their freedoms are in jeopardy, those who don’t fit the above either, are starting to rise up and fight again with confidence and conviction, and it’s a beautiful thing to see.

Why Does Disagreeing Have to be So Hateful?

“Ah, yes, whatever happened to that plucky little cult, Christianity?  Oh, that’s right, they’re 80% of the American people, and have taken over all three branches of government, country music, public schools, the bestseller list, and until recently, Katie Holmes.  You know, Christians, I don’t mind that you’re part of a dress-up cult that hates sex and worships magic but the paranoia, that does scare me.”  Bill Maher

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed how vile, vicious and hateful society as a whole is getting towards Christians, conservatives, and anyone espousing traditional values?  We only have to turn on the news for 5 minutes before we see yet another example of these attacks.  Last week, it was Anderson Cooper, CNN and a handful of other media sources that not only attempted to discredit 250,000 protesters and their support of smaller government, but came right out and insulted them (us) with crude sexual jokes unbecoming and unfitting for mainstream media journalists.  This week, the claws have come out against Carrie Prejean, Miss California who stood up for traditional marriage at the Miss USA pagent.  Since when did having a different opinion (an opinion, by the way, that is still held by the majority of Americans) call for vicious and hateful name-calling?  Here are some more:

“We are a nation that is unenlightened because of religion.  I do believe that.  I think that religion stops people from thinking.  I think it justifies crazies.  I think flying planes into a building was a faith-based initiative.  I think religion is a neurological disorder.”  Bill Maher

 ”I have a theory that you can’t find any saints anymore because of psychotropic medication.  I think that [in] the old days, the saints were hearing voices and they didn’t have any Thorazine to calm them down.  Now that we have all of this medication available to us, you can’t find a saint anymore.  In the old days it used to be you heard voices.  You can’t do that anymore.”  Joy Behar

 Or what about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez calling President Bush “the devil” back in 2006?  Or Janeane Garofalo, longtime hater of conservatives, who said this about last week’s Tea Parties:

“Let’s be very honest about what this is about.  It’s not about bashing Democrats, it’s not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don’t know their history at all.  This is about hating a black man in the White House.  This is racism straight up.”  Janeane Garofalo

Ms. Garofalo then went on to join the classiest of all entertainers to already go this route, and threw the sexual innuendo in there, which I will not quote. 

So we’ve seen so far that we cannot have traditional values, uphold Christ as our Savior, or vote conservatively in the polls or we will be publicly ridiculed on mainstream television by “professional” journalists, potentially lose the Miss USA pagent, be called a racist (completely unfounded–there was nothing racist about those tea parties), be crudely referred to in sexual terms, and told we have a neurological disorder in need of psychotropic medication.  And I’m just getting warmed up.

Air America host, Mike Malloy, called those attending the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2006 “neo-nazis.”  Al Franken, our new senator from Minnesota (God help us!), frequently hits conservatives below the belt and uses blasphemous language about Jesus as he mocks Christians. 

Now, to be fair, I have heard comments from some conservatives (I can think of two commends offhand) that I completely separate myself from and believe they fall into the category of “hateful,” but these are fewer and farther between than what we, unarguably, see on the left.  Even Juan Williams, Emmy Award winner and NPR Senior Correspondent, says that “the far left is extremely harsh and punishing when you don’t say exactly what they want you to say.”

This is America, the land of free speech and freedom of religion.  In the name of the god of the left wing, “tolerance,” we are slaughtering our freedoms and becoming more hateful and divisive a country by the day.  My prayer is that my passion never causes me to compromise my values.  But I also pray that in my defense of God’s Truth, I never abandon my commitment to follow God’s command to love Him and others above all else.  That is the mark of a Christian–love for God and love for others.  And if we abandon that in the culture today–if we fail to show God’s love in the face of this persecution or if we stoop to the level of the persecutions that are heaped upon us–then we are, in effect, taking our hands off and watching this world and the people in it become even more lost than they already are.

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.  The second is this:  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  There is no commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31).

“This is the message you heard from the beginning:  We should love one another.  Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother.  And why did he murder him?  Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous.  Do not be surprisesd, my brothers, if the world hates you.  We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers.  Anyone who does not love remains in death.  Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him” (1 John 3:11-15).