Monthly Archive for January, 2008

            The Christian base of western civilization began in Europe.  It is fitting that the end of the Christian base should be in Europe as well.  Long before the Reformation, Christianity spread its influence into northern and western Europe.  This influence has been so strong that it changes men—even men who never came to the place where they convert to Christianity.  They fell under the influence and structured government and community based on the teaching of a faith they did not publicly or privately embrace.

            This is part of what continues to tie the United States and Europe together. We are different cultures bound together by a common foundation.  The foundation of any creation determines what that creation will look like.  Whether it is DNA or a concrete foundation, the creation will reflect perfectly the foundation.  You cannot build a building that does not have the shape of the foundation.  We can do a variety of creative things above the foundation, but ultimately the building is limited and determined by its foundation.

            The only way to change the DNA or foundation is to destroy the foundation and being again.  That is the only way to change western society—the Christian foundation, often so ancient it must be excavated, must be destroyed and a new foundation built.  That is where we are at this time in world history.  We are witnessing a battle to destroy the foundations of our western society.  In America there continues to be an all out assault on Christianity.  It is no coincidence that the secular, pagan battle is only against Christianity. It is not religion that is the problem, from a secular viewpoint it is the life changing message of Christianity.  The same battle is even more advanced in Europe.  For centuries the European battle was to destroy the buildings of the Church, thus creating a museum attitude toward everything Christian.  This did not destroy the foundation but weakened the faith.  Mistakenly believing that they could leave the foundations as a testament to what once was, but no longer is, they left the foundations.  The seeds of revival blow through every now and then and the foundations were cleared ever so slightly—but the foundations remained.  Learning from their mistakes there is now a battle to destroy the foundations.  This is the battle to destroy the family, destroy the foundations of education, destroy the sanctity of life; all of these battles are part of the overriding plan to destroy the foundations of Christianity throughout the western world.

            The first force to fear in this battle is a new one for most of us.  For decades we knew that Muslims existed.  We knew they believed in Mohammed and we knew they controlled most of the oil in the Middle East.  What we did not know was that they seemed to be anti-American to the core.  We are not talking about just the fringe like we saw in 1979 in Iran, but suddenly Islam is not wiling to share the stage with anyone—especially Christians.  Countries where the rule of law is Islamic based are imprisoning Christians by the hundreds, they are forcing employers to fire Christians, and they are killing Christians for the crime of professing their religious beliefs in public.  All of these matters are completely unacceptable in the modern world.

            While all this is going on they are calling for us all to live together.  Does it strike you as funny that we are giving Muslims the same freedoms every religion shares in this country?  The only place we seem to have problems getting along is in the Muslim countries.  And why is that you might ask—simply because Muslims refuse to grant us the freedoms they are demanding in our country.

            It is a crime in a Muslim law country to convert from Islam to any other religion.  Muslims who convert to Christianity are given a death sentence.  They are considered to be infidels that are deserving of death.  Hardly the world of peace and toleration we are told to extend.

            Let’s move forward about one or two decades and see what the outcome will be when Europe is an Islamic Republic.  To many this might seem a far-fetched idea, but the rate of population increase of Muslims in Europe is astounding.  At the present rate, they may well be strong enough voting block to come to power as the lead of a coalition in most Western European countries in around a decade, maybe two decades on the outside.  This means that suddenly Europe would be controlled by Islamic law.  This means that Christianity would be illegal.  If Christianity is illegal the moral face of Christianity will fade rapidly.  It will be replaced by Muslim moral codes, including multiple marriages for men.  Capital punishment for criminals, including having a hand cut off for stealing and being killed for what many would consider minor offenses.

            To make matters worse, we would be hard pressed to cut off our relationship with the Islamic Republic of Europe.  Of course, we can sit here now and declare that we would never stand for something so close to home.  Yet, the facts speak for themselves.  We are allowing all of this to happen right now in countries we have favored trade status with over the single economic issue of oil.  Magnify the economics beyond oil to every basic trade item we purchase and suddenly it is not so hard to imagine that we tolerate the Islamic law for the sake of our cushy lives.  Stranger things have happened over the issue of money and comfort.

            In addition to trade issues, we will also be faced with international law issues in the form of treaties.  It will take great will power for us to abandon Europe simply because it has been transformed into an Islamic Republic.  This alone is one of the great dangers of the current mode of tolerance at all costs.  If nothing is wrong and there are no absolutes then we are foolish to try and establish a moral code for our interactions with other countries.  We will have to honor the treaties that exist between the US and Europe and as a result will be forced to continue to give favored help to our enemies.  Thus, we begin to bring about our own destruction and play a role in the eradication of the United States of America.

            In the alternative, we can cut off the Islamic Republic of Europe completely.  The problem with this approach is that it is not as simple as it seems.  To take such an action has its own set of problems.  For one, our economy is based on international trade.  Economically we cannot afford to go back into our shell.  Isolationism is impossible in a world so intertwined.  Our corporations are now multinational conglomerates.  So an Islamic Europe could well own major portions of American corporations.

            Another problem arises in situations like with Citgo.  Our first response to Chavez’s rants against President Bush is to stop doing business with his oil company—Citgo.  If we free him of his obligations to the United States, however, we enable Chavez to sell Venezuela’s oil to China.  Thus, we further harm ourselves while enriching China.  Not so simple a choice.

One does not have to look far to see that we are living in a troubled world.  Natural disasters, manmade disasters, war, terrorism, famine, AIDS, are all spreading rampantly in some parts of the globe.  It all adds up to trouble for the entire globe.  The world has gotten smaller, but the troubles have gotten bigger.  We are capable of killing more in minutes than the plague did in years.  Stress levels are rising.  Technology, designed to simplify our lives, has only served to shorten the leash we all have chained to our necks.  Like Pavlov’s dogs we salivate on cue.

            More than ever we need to find a place of solitude—a place within ourselves where we are at peace with who we are.  Historically, man has turned to the supernatural to find that place beyond himself.  Some would say that man created the idea of God for just such a reason as this.  Whether we believe in God or not, we must understand, and tolerate, the value of God in the lives of those who choose to believe in Him.

            It has never been the role of modern government to determine what a man believes about God.  In fact, the American experiment carries that belief to the extreme—government does not have the right to intervene in the development or furthering of God at any level.  This does not mean that government cannot acknowledge God as some say.  Rather it means that man has the right to find God wherever he will or not at all.

            Most western, and even eastern countries, have followed this system of government interaction with religion in large part.  Even though many countries in Europe have a state sponsored Church they do not require belief in the tenants of that Church, much less membership.  Even in the state Church system there has always been, in modern times, a freedom to believe according to the dictates of your own conscience.

            The right to freedom of religion and expression cut across political lines as well.  Liberals and conservatives agree that there must be freedom of religion and freedom of expression.  The disagreement between the left and the right is not one of foundation, it is one of interpretation.  What does the freedom of religion mean?  How involved should the government be in promoting or tolerating religion?  This depends on your worldview.  That there is freedom of religion and expression does not depend on your worldview.

            Many consider religious freedom to the first freedom.  It is not one that is granted by the government.  Rather it is a God-given right, or as America’s founders expressed it, a “self-evident” right.  However we refer to it there is little dispute in the existence of the right to every human on the planet.  It does not matter if the belief is in the majority in a culture; it only needs to be sincerely held.

            The Universal Declaration on Human Rights, drafted in 1948, even grants the rights we all know as religious freedom.  Article 18 reads:

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.

            The disputes that arise then are resolved by how much a particular religious belief interferes with the daily rules and regulations that guide society, our laws.  In instances where our laws are violated by religious belief there is the potential to limit religious belief.  And therein lays the conflict in a modern secular or religious world.  This conflict can usually be resolved by simply notifying the government of the existence of a particular right and how their actions violate the right.  Most often, when there is a sincere action on behalf of the government, these types of conflicts are resolved without resorting to legal action—even in the international justice system.

            The difficulties are simple to overcome in a system that is impartial and unbiased at its core.  The problem arises when the system is manipulated to protect one belief over another or to protect no belief at all.  Thus, it is bias that creates the problems with religious liberty.  Many do not realize that laws the world over are designed to protect sincerely-held religious beliefs.  The shortfall comes when judges and politicians and special interest groups intervene in the judicial process improperly.  They either insert their own beliefs into their legal opinions.  Or they pass laws that limit freedom and promote censorship of religious beliefs.  Or they want to suppress religious belief to appeal to their fundraising base.

            One response to these issues is seen in civilized countries like France passing laws that prohibit communication between people in public places.  Additionally, Belgium is considering a law that mirrors the French law.  And the Chinese have asked the French to help them craft an identical law.

            The French law is especially troubling for a number of reasons beyond the fact that it is a bad law.  The communist government of China has long studied the approach of the French to the issue of religious freedom.  Remember, one of the primary goals of the French Revolution, which coincided with our own American Revolution, was the eradication of religion from the national conscience.  The Chinese have asked the French to send a delegation of French law makers to help them better implement a law like the French law to help “legally” suppress religion in China.  This highlights the largest problem with the French approach.  France is considered a Western Democracy and they will be very influential in helping suppress religion in the East and in Eastern Europe if they are permitted to move forward without being forced to protect religious liberties.

            In this same vain, the Belgians are looking to implement a similar law.  The Italians have spent some time considering such a law.  They view it as a legitimate protection of religious liberties partly because the French have a law.  The French are, after all, a member of the European Union and therefore, their laws are assumed to be in keeping with the European Convention on Human Rights which protects religion.

            Yet, the French law was originally called a “mental manipulation” law—designed to protect innocent people from the clutches of religious fanatics.  Were this true we might all breath easier and thank the French for their concern for the weak among us.  Unfortunately, that is not the case.

            After a long fight, the Catholic Bishops in France were able to have the government drop the language regarding mental manipulation because it was too prejudicial.  The resulting law still violates the European Convention on Human Rights, though it has yet to be tested.

            The law does not stop only suicide cults or bazaar religious groups we would all agree need to be controlled.  Would that it did.  The key points of the law are this:  it is a crime when a person commits a “fraudulent abuse of the state of ignorance of the condition of weakness of either a minor or a person whose specific vulnerability, due to his age, and illness; a physical or psychological deficiency, or pregnancy.”  This specific section of the law can be violated by simply handing a Gospel tract to a seventeen year old minor or a pregnant lady.  Both actions would be a violation of the law.  Generally it is accepted that there would have to be more than one contact, but the law is not clear on this issue.

            The greatest problem comes not from this section of the law, but from the penalties imposed by the law.  On a second conviction for handing a leaflet to a minor, or a pregnant lady, or an old person the guilty person can be fined up to $75,000 and sentenced to up to 5 years in prison.  If the person is in authority at a Church the entire Church property can be confiscated by the government along with the legal association that forms the Church.

            This is the law the Belgians are considering copying.  This the law Italy has also considered.  This is the law the Chinese want to bring to the mainland to help them battle the Church.

            The truth of the matter is that religious freedom is essential for freedom of any kind.  We must preserve the right of self-determination on religious matters if we are to permit free speech, or free association.  If we continue to build one world, homogenized to look and feel the same we will destroy that one thing that makes modern civilization so rich—our diversity.  Our diversity can only be celebrated if it exists.  And our diversity only exists when we do not allow our governments to stop speech we disagree with.

            Freedom means that we will hear and see things we disagree with, sometimes on a daily basis.  We must protect the right to believe, even when the belief is a minority belief.