Christians Need Not Apply

Christians Need Not Apply Posted: 09 Oct 2015 04:28 PM PDT Editor’s Note: This is a well written article. But sadly, like many political commentators on the right, he conflates the whore of Rome with true Christianity. Written by  Selwyn Duke   “Haters of humanity” was the charge leveled against Christians in early first-millennium Rome. Thus impugned because they didn’t want to participate in the empire’s pagan festivals, they suffered a plight common to those swimming against their civilization’s tide: persecution. Of course, even in a nation that appreciates freedom of speech and religion, stigmatization of certain groups is inevitable. For as someone once pointed out, stigmas are the corollaries of values: If certain things are to be valued, it follows that their opposites will be devalued. As an example, you cannot value economic freedom highly without devaluing communism. Ergo, stigmas are necessary. And since they’re the flip side of values, what a civilization chooses to value is of utmost importance. So when Rome valued paganism, it quite naturally devalued Christianity. But this would change. Jesus’ faith was legalized in 313 A.D., and in 380 it would become the empire’s official religion. And it would so infuse and shape the West  that the Occident would become known as Christendom and the United States’ first president would say, “To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian.” For, in fact, Christian character was once considered integral to everything. Change in America But a change has been afoot in America. It has been happening quickly, so quickly that few people, even most astute culture warriors, fully appreciate what’s occurring. It has been hard not to hear of Kim Davis, the Rowan County, Kentucky, clerk jailed for contempt of court after refusing an order to issue “marriage” licenses to same-sex couples. She has been cheered by the Right and chided by the Left, portrayed as both a Christian hero and an oath-breaking zero. And not surprisingly, most of the debate has centered on the legality of her stance. Davis is, of course, defying a court order. But while U.S. District Judge David Bunning, who sent the clerk to prison, has said, “Oaths mean things,” what of the Supreme Court justices who, in issuing the unconstitutionalObergefell v. Hodges faux-marriage ruling, clearly violated their oath to uphold the Constitution? Should one submit to a rule of lawyers contrary to the rule of law? Of course, Davis is also defying Kentucky governor Steve Be­shear, who has ordered state clerks to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. And states do have wide-ranging powers under the Constitution. Yet even a governor doesn’t have the legitimate power to violate his state’s constitution. As to this, the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer recently wrote in “Clerk the Only One Obeying the Law” that the courts have no constitutionally granted power to strike down law and then pointed out: Here’s how the Kentucky constitution reads: [“]Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Kentucky. A legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid or recognized.[”] … Thus Kim Davis would actually be breaking the law and violating the constitution of the state of Kentucky by issuing same-sex licenses. Bottom line: Kim Davis is the only one in this sorry saga who is following the law and the Constitution. When she took her oath of office, it was an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of Kentucky. She did not take an oath to uphold the rulings of the Supreme Court, especially when submitting to such rulings would require her to violate her oath to uphold the Constitution. In the above Fischer is merely echoing Thomas Jefferson, who wrote in 1819 and 1820 that to give “to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres” makes our Constitution “a complete felo de se” (suicide pact) and “would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy.” Davis, however, has mainly cited not man’s but moral law in her defense. While her lawyer has appealed her case (and lost) based on freedom of religion, she unabashedly told Judge Bunning, “God’s moral law conflicts with my job duties,” reported CBSDC/AP. “You can’t be separated from something that’s in your heart and in your soul.” And whether it’s the rule of lawyers or of law, this reality cannot be ignored. No moral person places statesmen or the Supreme Court before the Supreme Being; this is why while many will emote about “the law” when it serves their ends, Americans have a long history of violating it with the understanding that, as Augustine of Hippo put it, “An unjust law is no law at all.” The antebellum abolitionist and civil-rights movements, for instance, involved defiance of the law. And, in fact, our very nation was founded on resistance to law, on a bold act of nullification — of the law of the British Empire.   Height of Hypocrisy Then there’s the matter of imperious would-be masters who make hypocrisy an art form. Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign may be listing because of her illegal use of a private e-mail server to conduct government business, but this didn’t stop her from tweeting about Davis on September 3, “Officials should be held to their duty to uphold the law — end of story.” And her former boss, Barack Obama, boldly violates federal immigration and other laws he finds inconvenient, as he ignores “sanctuary cities” and localities that violate federal drug laws (which are unconstitutional, though this certainly isn’t a factor for “unconstitutionalists”). And particularly apropos is the case of openly lesbian Dallas County Judge Tonya Parker, who said in 2012 that “she refuses to conduct marriage ceremonies for straight couples until same-sex couples can also wed,” reported New York’s Daily News at the time. Of course, given that judges may refuse to perform marriages, Parker’s case wouldn’t involve the kind of “violation of civil duty” of which Davis is accused. Yet it is perfectly analogous to another recent case, that of Marion County, Oregon, Judge Vance Day. Like Parker, Day decided to stop doing weddings altogether — in his case, nearly a year ago — over the faux-marriage issue. Like Parker, his reason is that the current law conflicts with his sense of right and wrong. Unlike Parker, however, his problem is that he didn’t want to feel pressure to “marry” same-sex couples after a 2014 federal court ruling expressing the belief that faux marriage should be government sanctioned in Oregon. And, unlike Parker, Day is now being investigated by a judicial-fitness commission. Notable here is that the Ohio Supreme Court’s Board of Professional Conduct just issued a ruling in August on the very same matter, stating in part, “A judge may not decline to perform all marriages in order to avoid marrying same-sex couples based on his or personal, moral, or religious beliefs.” Absolutely striking. A judge can refuse to perform marriages — but not for politically incorrect (e.g., Christian) reasons — and not to avoid performing faux marriages. So when Parker exited the marriage business because she thought such unions should be endorsed by government, it was hardly a blip on the radar screen. When Day does so because he believes such unions shouldn’t be, he’s investigated as unfit for office. When considering all the above, it’s clear that laws and standards are being applied selectively — but, actually, not all that inconsistently. Just consider another example from the judicial-standards front, when earlier this year the California Supreme Court prohibited state court judges from belonging to the Boy Scouts merely because, at the time, the organization reflected Christianity in banning open homosexuals from serving as troop leaders. Or consider the case of former Atlanta fire chief Kelvin Cochran, who was fired early last year after writing a Christian book entitled Who Told You That You Were Naked?, in which he briefly touched on homosexual behavior. Now ponder what Lifesite’s Jonathon van Maren related in February about a trip he had just taken: In Budapest … our tour guide stopped on the steps of the St. Stephan Cathedral to explain how the Hungarian Communists “dealt with” the Christians. It wasn’t that you couldn’t be a Christian, she said. You could pray at home, worship at home with your family, even get baptized and go to church. However, you had a choice. “You could either be a Christian,” she told us, “or you could be successful.” So when GOP presidential contender Mike Huckabee recently tweeted “Kim Davis in federal custody removes all doubts about the criminalization of Christianity in this country,” perhaps he wasn’t being literally accurate. After all, churches aren’t yet being shuttered. But implicit in everything that’s occurring, with a wink and a nod, is that old message: You can be Christian — or you can be successful. And leftists have said this in so many words. Not that long ago a number of stories were in the news about Christian bakers who refused to bake cakes for faux weddings. And if you read Internet comments, you’d observe a common sentiment: “If you can’t do the job, you can’t have the job.” The problem is that any and every “job” is increasingly being defined as requiring absence of Christian principle. The quoted standard tendentiously places the onus on the Christians, but here’s what is really being said: “You’ll conform to our agenda — or we’ll destroy you to the point of pennilessness.” A good example is couple Aaron and Melissa Klein, former owners of the bakery Sweet Cakes by Melissa in Gresham, Oregon. They were forced to shut down their business in 2013 after refusing two lesbians a “wedding” cake and being charged with discrimination. But this wasn’t enough for the sexual storm troopers. Because earlier this year administrative judge Alan McCullough fined them $135,000 and ruled that the funds will go to the lesbians for “emotional, mental, and physical suffering.” The government perhaps wanted to persecute in private, though, because Oregon labor commissioner Brad Avakian “placed an effective gag order on the Kleins, ordering them to ‘cease and desist’ from speaking publicly about not wanting to bake cakes for same-sex weddings based on their Christian beliefs,” wrote the Daily Signal in July. This apparently is part of Avakian’s attempt to “rehabilitate” the Kleins, which, stated their lawyer, Anna Harmon, he made clear was his goal with “those whose beliefs do not conform to the state’s ideas.” The good news is that, with the help of Christian relief organization Samaritan’s Purse, far more than the fine amount has been raised for the Kleins’ cause. Yet granting relief to those targeted for “rehabilitation” is becoming a monumental task. As Samaritan’s Purse reported in April in a piece entitled “Persecution Against U.S. Christians On the Rise”: In Indiana, a small-town pizzeria owned by a Christian family closed its doors after receiving death and firebombing threats after the owner said in a television interview that he would not want to cater a gay wedding because it would conflict with his faith. In New Mexico, the state Supreme Court ruled that a photographer could not refuse to shoot gay ceremonies — even though Elaine Photography owner Elaine Huguenin said that she would happily photograph gay customers, but her faith forbid her from doing so in a context that seemed to endorse same-sex marriage. In Washington state, a florist was sued for discrimination by the government because she could not in good conscience create custom arrangements for a same-sex ceremony. It should be noted that this is unprecedented in American history. Government has long trumped freedom of association under the pretext that businesses, though privately owned, are nonetheless “public accommodations.” Yet what we’re seeing now is a huge step beyond: not merely forcing businesses to serve certain classes of people, but forcing them to service certain types of events. The analogy has been drawn, almost to the point of hoariness, that the above examples are akin to compelling a Jewish or black businessman to service a Nazi or KKK affair. The reality is, of course, that no one would even consider such tyranny. Nor did it faze media, politicians, and activists when pundit Steven Crowder produced a video earlier this year of Muslim bakers in Dearborn, Michigan, refusing to provide faux wedding cakes. But when Christians do it, they’re haters. And this double standard is everywhere. Just consider again the aforementioned ruling by the Ohio Supreme Court’s Board of Professional Conduct. Reporting on the consequences for judges “who stop performing all marriages to avoid marrying same-sex couples,” CBS News wrote that they “may be interpreted as biased and could be disqualified from any case where sexual orientation is an issue.” Yet who doesn’t have biases? (Note that unlike a “prejudice,” a “bias” can be positive, negative, or neutral.) Did Judge Tonya Parker not exhibit a bias when refusing to perform marriages in the name of homosexual activism? And what of Supreme Court justices Elena Kagan, an open lesbian, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, both of whom officiated at faux weddings? Inferring bias, critics such as Representative Steve King (R-Iowa) say they should have recused themselves from the Obergefellcase and suggest they could be impeached for not doing so. Liberals have, of course, scoffed at the notion, but is it substantially different from the Ohio board’s position? Putting their own biases aside when ruling on law — just calling balls and strikes, as Chief Justice John Roberts put it — is a challenge for all judges, not just a subset. It is quite possibly the most important part of their job and one that, as recent history illustrates, too many jurists are failing at miserably. So the scrutiny received by judges such as Vance Day is not due to their having that universal thing called “bias.” It’s due to their having that increasingly unfashionable thing called a Christian worldview. Putting Christians in Their Place This is why all the discussion about whether Kim Davis is “breaking the law” misses the deeper and more important point: What does it say about our civilization when laws and standards — or, at least, how the powers-that-be wish to interpret them — preclude authentic Christianity in the halls of government and the marketplace? It says that while Justice David Josiah Brewer could write in an 1892 Supreme Court ruling of “a volume of unofficial declarations” and “mass of organic utterances” stating “that this is a Christian nation,” it can no longer rightly be said. The once stigmatized is now valued, and the once valued is now stigmatized. This inversion of virtue and vice was predictable — and predicted. In their 1990 book After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 90’s, homosexual activists Hunter Madsen and Marshall Kirk called for the valuing of homosexuality, prescribing a desensitization of Americans to homosexuality via a “continuous flood of gay-related advertising,” a “conversion of the average American’s emotions, mind, and will, through a planned psychological attack, in the form of propaganda fed to the nation via the media.” Furthermore, they said that once homosexuality was normalized, those who would “still feel compelled” to oppose it would be “cow[ed] and silence[d] … as far as possible” and that if homosexual activists can “produce a major realignment solidly in favour of gay rights, the intransigents (like the racists of twenty years ago) will eventually be effectively silenced by both law and polite society.” And what do we see today? Christians called haters and bigots, hate-speech laws in most Western lands prohibiting criticism of homosexuality, and the stifling of dissent via economic pressure. And the homosexuality agenda is an ideal vehicle through which to devalue Christianity. Just consider, for instance, that the Catholic Church has defined teaching stating that same-sex attraction is “disordered” and homosexual acts are objectively evil. Moreover and contrary to what some may suppose, this teaching cannot change; even Pope Francis, whom the media has portrayed incorrectly on the matter, has said as much. And, of course, any traditional Protestant will take the same position. And the folly of doing otherwise is easily illustrated. What is one supposed to say? Adultery is a sin, fornication is a sin, self-gratification is a sin, watching pornography is a sin, but homosexuality is … what? A lifestyle choice, like living on a houseboat? This is why I’ve often noted that the homosexuality activists aren’t asking for equal treatment, but preferential treatment, and it is an untenable position. For accepting homosexual behavior isn’t just accepting homosexual behavior: It’s accepting the complete collapse of the Christian model (and this applies to certain other faiths as well) for man’s sexuality. This is just one reason why no faithful Christian can even consider accepting homosexual behavior. And this is the reason Christianity cannot be valued if the homosexuality agenda is. Once people accept that calling homosexual behavior sinful is “hateful” and “bigoted,” they will consider Christianity a hateful religion. And “Voila!”: At this point you have successfully placed the faith and its churches in the same category as hate groups, such as the Nazis, Aryan Nations, or the Ku Klux Klan, and made them grist for the Southern Poverty Law Center’s HateWatch page. And this makes clear the economic persecution facing Christians. After all, what prospects does an open and avowed Nazi or Klan member have for getting a high-paying job? And what else lies ahead? Just as asteroids have a trajectory that enables scientists to accurately predict their future location, a culture also has an observable trajectory. Should we remain on ours — and only powerful applications of energy can alter a great body’s path — a further perversion of the “separation of church and state” myth may be used to completely exclude Christians from serving in government; in this, Kim Davis’ plight is a portent of things to come. On the same basis, Christians may one day even be prohibited from voting or from receiving government benefits (after all, “religion mustn’t influence government,” and public money mustn’t fund religious entities). Far-fetched? Well, if you’d told people in 1954 that in a few generations homosexuality would be celebrated and Christians who opposed it castigated, they’d have called you crazy. But, of course, the story of man is quite crazy. This is why modern times have seen the murder of priests in 1920s Mexico and during the Spanish Civil War, and why Christians were regularly persecuted under Marxist regimes and suffer in the Mideast and elsewhere today. In accordance with Jesus’ warning, “You shall be hated by all men for my name’s sake,” Christian persecution hasn’t been an anomaly in the annals of man but a recurring theme. And what recurs the world over can occur anywhere — even over in our world. For as homosexuality and other un-Christian elements continue to be valued, Christianity will correspondingly be devalued. And, as the communists and Romans proved, when this happens enough, Christians may be thrown into gulags or the mouths of lions. After all, haters of humanity are fair game for most anything. This article is an example of the exclusive content that’s available only by subscribing to the New American print magazine. Twice a month get in-depth features covering the political gamut: education, candidate profiles, immigration, healthcare, foreign policy, guns, etc. Digital as well as print options are available!

A SOLUTION FOR THE SAME-SEX MARRIAGE PROBLEM

A SOLUTION FOR THE SAME-SEX MARRIAGE PROBLEM

Posted: 17 Sep 2015 11:28 PM PDT

By Chuck Baldwin
September 17, 2015
NewsWithViews.com

Right now, the liberty movement is divided almost in half between those favoring the SCOTUS ruling legalizing same-sex marriage and those opposed (count me in the opposed camp). So, right now, the liberty movement is completely stymied over this issue. The only ones who win in such a case are big-government Orwellians.

To be sure, the SCOTUS decision to legalize same-sex “marriage” was the result of decades of relentless propaganda from the national news media, liberal politicians, and college professors throughout America.

Think about it: what do Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan, Stephen Breyer, and Sonia Sotomayor know that John Locke, Thomas More, Emer de Vattel, Algernon Sidney, William Rawle, Hugo Grotius, William Blackstone, William Penn, James Wilson, John Marshall, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, John Adams, John Jay, Daniel Webster, Francis Scott Key, Hugo Black, Rutherford B. Hayes, and William O. Douglas didn’t know?

In other words, just as in the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion-on-demand, the Obergefell decision legalizing same-sex “marriage” was judicial activism pure and simple. There were no precedents for either decision. Think of the brilliant minds in law, philosophy, and religion over two thousand years of Western Civilization that somehow missed the “right” of homosexuals to “marry.”

What I’m saying is, I realize that militant homosexuals, ultra-leftists, and judicial activists have been waging war on America’s historic Christian values for decades–and they won a huge victory with the Obergefell decision. I also understand that these people will never be satisfied until they have totally and thoroughly expunged these values from America’s public life. There is no question they will resort to any tactic–no matter how morally unjust or constitutionally corrupt–to achieve their radical, amoral agenda. Kim Davis will not be the last Christian to be persecuted for her faith in this country.

That said, the Obergefell decision has successfully divided the liberty movement almost in half, between those who agree with the decision (on whatever grounds) and those who disagree. But, instead of arguing over the SCOTUS decision, here is what ALL OF US in the liberty movement should be doing: we should be using whatever influence we have to promote the idea of taking marriage OUT OF THE HANDS OF THE STATE ALTOGETHER.

Most of us realize that marriage is sacred; that it’s much more than just a civil contract. (Only the state itself reinvented marriage as being merely a civil contract.) One doesn’t have to be a Christian to acknowledge this distinction. Throughout the history of Western Civilization, the state seldom had authority over marriage. Think of it: for over 1,800 years of Western Civilization, the state had little–if anything–to do with marriage. (In America, only the colony of Massachusetts is recorded as requiring state marriage licenses before the mid-nineteenth century.)

So, why do we even look to the state for a license to marry? The fact is, WE SHOULDN’T. All of the bickering over Obergefell only serves to ensconce the notion that the state has legitimate authority over marriage. IT DOESN’T.

In Pilgrim America and in Colonial America–and until only recently in modern America–Common Law (Natural Law) marriage was universally recognized as being, not only lawful, but sacrosanct. The idea of asking the state for permission to marry was as absurd as asking the state for permission to take communion or to be baptized.

For example, the State of Pennsylvania didn’t outlaw Common Law marriage until 2005. And the only reason the vast majority of states do not recognize Common Law marriage today is because the Church has completely surrendered the Scriptural teaching on the subject and has willingly (even happily) turned what is uniquely a divine institution over to the state.

In other words, ladies and gentlemen, the only one to blame for the decision of the Supreme Court to legalize same-sex marriage is THE CHURCH. The ultra-leftists and militant homosexuals would have had NO CHANCE of achieving victory at the Supreme Court had the churches of America been doing their job over the last half-century or more to educate people on the historic Natural Law principles governing marriage and the state. (Virtually ALL of the major problems we are dealing with today are the result of the absence of sound instruction from the pulpits of America.)

But since the Church’s surrender of the sanctity of marriage, here is the current reality: 40 states do not legally recognize Common Law marriage. That means, those 40 states see only the state as having authority over marriage. But the state has NO AUTHORITY over marriage and cannot legally sanction ANY marriage. I remind you Jesus said, “What therefore God hath joined together . . . .” Only GOD can join couples in marriage.

The best that I can determine, these are the 10 states that still recognize Common Law marriage: Alabama, Colorado, Kansas, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Iowa, Montana, Texas, Utah, and Oklahoma. And Utah only seems to recognize Common Law marriage after the fact. In addition, Oklahoma is currently in the process of banning all State marriage licenses. This is exactly what all 50 states should do. (New Hampshire recognizes Common Law marriage for inheritance purposes only; so it should not be included as a Common Law State.)

So, including Utah, the people in ten states are free to marry WITHOUT a State license. And that’s exactly what every freedomist in those states should start promoting–and promoting LOUDLY. And freedomists in the other 40 states should start demanding that their State legislatures once again recognize Common Law marriage. Maybe people in those states should even consider civil disobedience and marry outside the licensing authority of the State. After all, if God has joined a man and woman together, what difference does it make if the State–or anyone else–recognizes it or not? If enough pastors and churches would do this, it wouldn’t take long for State legislatures to enact appropriate legislation.

Let the state recognize or not recognize to its heart’s content; let it embrace all of the perversion it wants. You can bet polygamy will be legalized next. And then what? Pedophilia? Bestiality? At some point, the sacred institutions of marriage and the Church will be forced to separate themselves from a suicidal society just as they did when the Roman Empire was collapsing. In Rome–as in oppressed nations today–Christians and churches mostly took their worship and sacred ceremonies underground. And, if history teaches anything, it teaches us that no civilization has long survived after socially embracing aberrant sexual behaviors. And America won’t either.

Let’s face it: the federal government in D.C. is leading America over an economic, political, moral, and cultural cliff. So, why do we keep looking to D.C. to fix the problem? THEY WON’T DO IT. As Ronald Reagan famously said, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government IS the problem.”

And the two institutions we should IMMEDIATELY extract from government–the two institutions that should have NEVER been allowed to be placed under the authority of government to begin with–are the institutions of marriage and the Church.

How in the name of common sense can pastors and churches take a Scriptural stand on the sanctity of marriage when they have allowed the Church itself to be bastardized by accepting the 501c3 tax-exempt organization status from Washington, D.C., and incorporation status from the states?

Think of it: our spiritual “leaders” have allowed the two most sacred institutions on earth (marriage and the Church) to be prostituted on the altar of state recognition. Think of it another way: our 501c3 pastors have become little more than pimps for the IRS and, now, a radical, activist Supreme Court. Do pastors really want Caesar’s blessing that badly?

Regarding marriage: we should marry under Natural Law (Common Law) ONLY.

Regarding the Church: it should be removed from 501c3 non-profit organization and State incorporation status–and if the pastor and church refuse to extract themselves, we should extract ourselves from THEM.

We either “come out” from this leviathan or we will be swallowed by it.

Yes, the radical left and militant homosexuals will continue to press their anti-Christian agenda with every means possible. Yes, those of us who have Christian, traditional and moralist convictions are going to be forced to defend these historic principles tooth and nail. But there can be no victory whatsoever by willfully surrendering the Natural Law principles upon which our convictions are predicated. Neither can there be victory by pretending that Caesar’s law is Supreme Law, because it’s not! There is a Court above the court. There is a King above kings. There is a Law above law.

Our founders gave their lives in order to bequeath to us a country in which we didn’t have to decide between obeying God and obeying government, as this constitutional republic was designed to protect our duty to God. Current national leaders–facilitated by America’s spiritual leaders–are taking that wonderful bequeathment away from us.

Therefore, say it anyway you want, “Don’t tread on me,” or “We must obey God rather than men,” but say it we must. And if Christian men and women cannot say it in defense of the sanctity and autonomy of marriage and the Church, they cannot say it at all.

P.S. I have a four-message DVD that I believe is absolutely essential for Christian people–and others who believe in our founding principles–to help them understand Natural Law. The title of the DVD series is “Liberty And Law.” Here are the message titles:

• Biblical Evidence for Natural Law (I show you the Scriptural evidence for Natural Law in this message.)

• Christ’s Law of The Sword (This message explains what Christ meant when He told Peter in the Garden of Gethsemane, “Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” (Matt. 26:52, KJV) Believe me, He did NOT mean that Christians are supposed to lay down their means of self-defense and never use the sword. I show from the Scriptures exactly what Jesus was saying to Peter. And, trust me, it will probably surprise you, as I doubt you have been taught this truth in church. And it will also help you to better understand a whole host of other scriptural principles as a result.)

• Liberty in Law (There is true liberty only in Law; but this Law does not ALWAYS mean the laws of men.)

• The Law of Necessity (This is a basic Natural Law principle that was demonstrated repeatedly throughout the Bible, including by our Lord Jesus Christ Himself.)

This is one of the most important message-series I have ever delivered. And its truths are needed as much NOW as they were when our pastors thundered them forth in the churches of Colonial America–maybe more so.

To order my DVD, “Liberty And Law,” click here.

• If you appreciate this column and want to help me distribute these editorial opinions to an ever-growing audience, donations may now be made by credit card, check, or Money Order. Use this link.

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© 2015 Chuck Baldwin – All Rights Reserved

HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE NOT SANCTIONED BY THE BIBLE

HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE NOT SANCTIONED BY THE BIBLE

Brother Dillard, This was posted by Religious News Service. Your Comments please: (Bro. C. M.)
Hi, Brother C.M.! Well, well, what a subtle twisting of truth! Lucifer is up to his old tricks. It is reminiscent of the Serpent in the Garden of Eden. There is considerable truth in it, but twisted to make a horrible lie. That is what the serpent did in Eden, and what he continues to do today. I shall comment in paragraphs of rebuttal so labeled. I assume the entire article is an exact copy of what appeared in media. The article and my rebuttal appear next.

“For those who look to the Bible to restrict marriage to one man and one woman, the primordial source is Genesis 2, the second account of the creation of humanity, in which God forms a man out of the dust and a woman out of the man’s rib. The chapter seems to set up what they now call “biblical marriage,” declaring (in the King James Version), “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”

[Rebuttal] The author is knowingly wrong here. The primordial source is Genesis 1. Genesis 2 is indeed an expanded account but one that reveals God (Elohim) in the creation of a different office work (Jehovah-elohim) to deal with fallen mankind. It does indeed set up biblical marriage as it was then and has continued to be for the past 6,000 years or more. Note the affirmation of Jesus about this in Matthew 19:4-6

“So how can this account be considered supportive of same-sex marriage?”

[Rebuttal] The answer to this question is simple. It cannot!

“For starters, the Hebrew word “adam” that is translated as “man” means “humanity” or “human being” — in the genderless sense that was once common English usage (as in, “man is the measure of all things”). Thus, in Genesis I.26, God says, “Let us make adam (humanity) in our image.” Unlike English, Hebrew differentiates adam from the gendered word for man, ish.”

[Rebuttal] As far as I can presently determine, this paragraph is true, except the author intentionally omits that in Genesis One that it goes on to say that the “adam” (mankind) under consideration is specifically named: “Male and female created He them.” Eve is as much “adam” (Mankind) as Adam was. There was no cause to refer to Adam as “ish” because there was no other male human on earth.

“In Genesis 2, the person we know as Adam is repeatedly identified simply as ha-adam – the human. Thus, Genesis 2.18 has God saying, “It is not good for the human to be alone. I will make a fitting helper for him.” (“Him” because adam is a masculine noun in Hebrew in the same way that nauta — sailor — is a feminine noun in Latin.) Note that God does not say anything about procreation as the reason for instituting this human relationship. Procreation is the order of the day in Genesis 1 (“be fruitful and multiply”), but that injunction has nothing to do with marriage.”

[Rebuttal] The author’s comparison of “adam” and “nauta” is contradictory. The gender of words in ancient languages does not necessarily denote sex. But, “Him” is gender specific. “Sailor” is not. Again, the Genesis Two account is an expanded, more detailed account of Genesis One. It is not contradictory to Genesis One. The “Ish” (Adam) is called “Adam” (mankind) because there was no other human form in existence. Ish (a man) comes into play much later, when there were humans (plural) on the earth. The helper which God would make for Adam is indeed fitting inasmuch as the Hebrew word literally carries the idea of “according to his front.” The purpose is aptly illustrated in electrical connections. It takes a male plug and a female receptacle to transmit electricity. Similarly, in procreation that type of connection is necessary to transmit the species. This terminology can portray nothing less than conjugal relationships of procreation. It is an expanded presentation of what is meant in Genesis One “Be fruitful and multiply.” To say that this has nothing to do with marriage is outright silly. God consistently in every age condemns fornication and adultery.

But what about Genesis 2.24: “Therefore a man shall leave…”? Isn’t that a mandate for “biblical marriage”?

[Rebuttal] Yes it is! A marriage as a civil contract is of recent origin. Biblical marriage consists of mutual agreements and pledges plus a consummation. Such union of a couple is not consummated as a marriage except in the act of sexual intercourse. So it has always been, and so it is presently.

No. Although traditional English translations employ the prescriptive future tense, the Hebrew is simply the descriptive present, now using the gendered ish: “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother, and cleaves to his wife, so that they become one flesh.” Genesis 2 is a just-so story, explaining why, at the time it was written, a guy would leave his parents and establish a new marital relationship.

[Rebuttal] The author is wrong again about biblical Hebrew. Yes, English uses tense of verb, but Hebrew does not use tense at all. All action is presented as complete or incomplete. The incomplete verb, as here, is understood as a continuing process. “Therefore shall a man (any man in any age) proceed to leave his father and his mother and (continue) to cleave to his wife.” It is a never-ending process as long as humans remain on the earth in the flesh.

In a word, Genesis 2 is all about the human need for permanent companionship — companionship of an intimate fleshly kind. Whoever wrote it would, I believe, understand exactly what the desire for same-sex marriage is all about — and why it is good.

[Rebuttal] Agreed to the last five words. Moses wrote it under inspiration of God. I am certain he understood quite well the horrendous sin of homosexual co-habitation – but why it is evil. After all, sin is the misuse of anything from its intended purpose.

MILITARY SUFFERS WAVE OF ‘GAY’ SEX ASSAULTS

Posted: 28 May 2013 06:23 PM PDT

 

WND RADIO

 

‘We’ve got a male-on-male problem here’

 

A recent military report on sexual assault in the military shocked many in Washington and around the nation, but a leading expert on military personnel revealed the prevalence of men assaulting other men is one of the major headlines in this study.

 

The extended analysis of the report first appeared in Monday’s edition of the the Washington Times.

 

 

The Defense Department survey of sexual assault in the military during fiscal 2012 estimated 26,000 assaults took place in the armed forces. Nearly 3,000 of them were formally reported. Just more than 6 percent of women reported being victims of assault and 1.2 percent of men said the same. Given the much larger number of men in the military, those numbers suggest 14,000 of the assaults in the Pentagon study happened to men.

 

Among the assaults formally reported, 88 percent of reports came from women and 12 percent from men. The numbers are getting dramatically worse.

 

“The number of reports of sexual assaults among military personnel have actually increased by 129 percent since 2004,” said Center for Military Readiness President Elaine Donnelly, who pointed out the number of formal reports of sexual assault jumped from 1,275 to 2,949 in just eight years.

 

 

She told WND when factoring in civilians working for or around the military, the increase in that time is 98 percent.

 

 

Women are identified as the attacker in just two percent of all assaults, meaning most men who suffer assault are targeted by other men.

“So we’ve got a male-on-male problem here. The Department of Defense doesn’t want to comment on this. They know that the numbers are there. They say that they care, but all the attention is usually given to the female members of the military who are subjected to sexual assault,” Donnelly said.

 

 

The Washington Times article also includes analysis from Aaron Belkin, who heads The Palm Center. He said the rise in male-on-male sexual assault does not reflect the increase of homosexuals in the military but, rather, those assaults are ”somewhat similar to prison rape.”

 

 

“Well, that’s a great slogan to use for recruiting young men into the military, isn’t it? It’s outrageous. And yet, the Department of Defense doesn’t quite know what to do with these figures, and so they just sort of put them in there and hope nobody notices,” said Donnelly, who points out The Palm Center is a homosexual activist organization.

While Donnelly fiercely opposed repealing the ban on homosexuals serving openly in the military, she said it’s important to keep monitoring the numbers to determine how much that policy change specifically contributes to the problem. She said the increase in sexual assaults against female service members should not be diminished, either. Donnelly said a lot of work lies ahead to reverse this trend, but the military and the federal government are kidding themselves if they don’t think some major policy decisions aren’t contributing to the rise in sexual violence.

 

“I think we have to start with the basics, and that means basic training. Back in 1998, unanimously, the Kassebaum-Baker Commission came out with recommendation to separate basic training for Army, Air Force and Navy trainers, (to) do it like the Marines do. The Marines train basic training separately, male and female at Parris Island. That’s a good thing to do. It’s a good first start,” Donnelly said.

“Second, they should stop pretending that sexuality does not matter. You cannot solve a problem by extending it into the combat arms. The big push is for women in combat, this argument that we have to have women in the infantry so they’ll be respected more and they won’t be assaulted,” said Donnelly, who noted that the strategy for women in combat that started more than a generation ago from then-Rep. Pat Schroeder, D-Colo., has been thoroughly discredited.

 

 

“Respect for women in the military today is higher than ever, but the sexual assault numbers keep climbing up,” she said. “I think before we start implementing a theory that’s been discredited.  The members of the Pentagon and the people who make policy in Congress as well, they need to stop.  They need to assess where we are, what has happened in the last two decades and they need to stop pretending that a lot of sensitivity training or highly paid consultants, that that is going to make a difference in the sex problems we’re seeing right now,” said Donnelly.

In 2012, Donnelly told WND that the statistics showed a more than 20 percent increase in reported sexual assaults on males.

Homosexual Marriage not Conducive to Religious Freedom

 

By Erick Erickson

 

Published March 26, 2013

 

FoxNews.com

 

Read more:  http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/03/26/gay-marriage-religious-freedom-are-incompatible/?intcmp=obnetwork#ixzz2UALiTAuC

 

Excerpts from the above article:

 

Christian photographers Elane Photography in New Mexico were approached by a same sex couple looking to hire a wedding photographer. Elane Photography politely declined citing their Christian faith and were sued by the couple under the state’s anti-discriminatory laws, and won. In New Mexico you apparently have no right to your free expression and practice of faith any longer.

 

– In Lexington, Ky., a T-shirt shop called Hands On Originals was approached by the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization about printing shirts for the group. The T-shirt company politely declined and even sought out quotes and gave the group referrals to other T-shirt printers, along with comparable prices. They were promptly sued by the group under Lexington’s anti-discriminatory laws and forced to comply with a lengthy investigation. The city’s power-drunk human rights commission said the shop will be “required by law to participate in the investigation.”

 

“We have subpoena power and have the backing of the law,” Raymond Sexton, the executive director of the Human Rights Commission told Fox News.“We are a law enforcement agency and people have to comply.”

 

Leftist groups are trying to get the company evicted from their premises. The city now has school districts freezing their business with the privately owned company. Meanwhile, the owner of the company tried to defend his faith and decision in an op-ed in the paper.

 

– A Methodist church in New Jersey was sued for not offering its facility for use during same-sex weddings. A judge ruled against the church.

 

– A same-sex couple from California sued a Hawaiian bed and breakfast privately owned by a Christian woman for not allowing them to rent a room.

 

– A bed and breakfast in Alton privately owned by a Christian couple was sued when they would not host a same-sex civil union ceremony.

 

– Owners of a small, privately owned inn in Vermont declined to host a same sex wedding reception due to their religious views and were sued.

 

– An employee of Allstate insurance wrote an essay online disagreeing with same-sex marriage and was reportedly fired from his job as a result.

 

– Catholic Charities was barred from assisting in adoptions in Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., and Illinois and excluded from future contracts because it declined to consider same sex couples. Sorry kids, but the agenda impresarios need to make an example.

 

There are even more examples. The fight has only just begun. Might as well stop trying to convince yourself it hasn’t.

 

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/03/26/gay-marriage-religious-freedom-are-incompatible/?intcmp=obnetwork#ixzz2Pb23ePeR

 

A free people and the IRS cannot co-exist!
The IRS must be destroyed now!  <:} Bob Minarik

 

 

Huckabee:Evangelicals Will Walk if GOP Backs Gay Marriage

Wednesday, March 20, 2013 05:49 PM

By: Jim Meyers and Kathleen Walter

Mike Huckabee warns that Republicans risk losing the vote from evangelical Christians if they back away from their opposition to gay marriage.

Last week, Ohio Sen. Bob Portman announced he has reversed his position and now supports gay marriage.

In an exclusive interview with Newsmax TV, former Arkansas Gov. Huckabee — and ordained Southern Baptist minister — was asked if he sees the GOP ever pivoting and backing gay marriage.

“They might. And if they do, they’re going to lose a large part of their base because evangelicals will take a walk,” he responds.

“And it’s not because there’s an anti-homosexual mood, and nobody’s homophobic that I know of, but many of us, and I consider myself included, base our standards not on the latest Washington Post poll, but on an objective standard, not a subjective standard.

“I have great sympathy and extraordinary admiration for Sen. Portman. I consider him a friend and I value his work in the Senate and think he’s a great person. The mistake is that we sometimes base our public policy decisions on how we feel, how we think, maybe even some personal experiences, and we don’t regard a lot of these issues from the standpoint of an objective standard.

“Let me explain what I mean by that. If we have subjective standards, that means that we’re willing to move our standards based on the prevailing whims of culture. Politicians have an obligation to be thermostats, not just thermometers. They’re not simply to reflect the temperature of the room, or the culture, as it were. They’re to set the standards for law, for what’s right, for what’s wrong, understanding that not everybody’s going to agree with it.
“On this issue, I recognize the culture is moving away from the traditional standard, but it’s almost like saying, well, we have a basketball team and nobody on the team can hit the goal that’s 10 feet off the floor so we’re going to lower the goal down to six feet and that way everybody can slam dunk the ball.

“So the question is, have you improved your basketball game? Or have you actually just changed the standard so it looks like you’re doing better? And that’s my concern.”

The truth about children with ‘gay’ parents

A group of professors has debunked the research of a sociologist, finding that children with heterosexual parents do better in school than those raised by homosexuals.
Dr. Douglas Allen, Burnaby Mountain professor of economics at Simon Fraser University, tells OneNewsNow that he, Dr. Catherine Pakaluk of Ave Marie University, and Dr. Joseph Price of Brigham Young University took a look at a large study conducted by Stanford sociologist Dr. Michael Rosenfeld that found no difference between children who are reared by heterosexual parents and those raised by homosexual couples. The three found a mistake in the research that completely alters the outcome.
“It turns out the children from these homes don’t do as well. They’re about 35 percent more likely to fail a grade,” Allen reports about youngsters raised by homosexuals.
But homosexual households, adds Allen, are not the only ones that prove problematic for children’s educational success.
“If you grow up with your parents cohabitating, but they’re heterosexual, you’re about 15 percent more likely than [those with] same-sex parents to make normal progress through schools,” the professor explains. “If you have a never-marriedsingle mom, you’re about 23 percent more likely to make normal progress through school compared to growing up in a same-sex household.”
According to Allen, every time a study that claims no harm to children raised by same-gender couples is released, it has been successfully disputed when put under a microscope.
“The gold standard is to have married, heterosexual parents,” Allen concludes. “I mean, every study pretty well finds that. It doesn’t matter what dimension you’re looking at; there’s no question — the gold standard is having two parents, married, opposite sex.”
The study was published in the peer-reviewed journal Demography. Since it is available by subscription only, Allen suggests finding a library that subscribes.
Allen is an award-winning teacher and a member of the Ruth Institute Circle of Experts.

MY 2 DADS: CHILDHOOD NOT SO ‘HAPPY AND GAY’

By Mike McManus
It is massively wrong according to a new, very large, thorough study published this week by the journal Social Science Research. It was written by Mark Regnerus, a scholar at the University of Texas. The New Family Structures Study, or NFSS, is a breakthrough report.
Regnerus compares how young adult children, aged 18-39, of a parent who has had a same-sex relationship fare on 40 different social, emotional and relational outcomes when compared with traditional and other families.
The biggest differences were between children of women who have had a lesbian relationship – and those raised by still-married biological parents.
Fully 69 percent of those with lesbian mothers were on welfare as children – four times the 17 percent in intact families ever had that experience. In fact, 38 percent of the adult children of lesbian mothers are currently on welfare versus only 10 percent of those with married parents. That’s the same 4-1 ratio.
Only 8 percent of adult children from intact homes were unemployed when interviewed in 2011 versus 28 percent with a lesbian parent.
What’s most shocking is that only two people of those with married parents were ever touched sexually by a parent or an adult – while 23 percent of those with a lesbian mother had that experience! Golly, they are 11 times more apt to be molested!
The design of the NFSS research was brilliant.
Most research on the impact of homosexual parenting has relied on interviews with same-sex parents who are from convenience samples.  For example, the National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study conducted last year “recruited entirely from self-selection from announcements posted at lesbian events, in women’s bookstores and in lesbian newspapers in Boston, Washington and San Francisco.”
Such a sample is biased toward including better-educated, wealthier people who visit bookstores. What about the less educated or less likely to be employed? They aren’t interviewed. Of course, the children of these more affluent parents are more apt to do well.
By comparison, NFSS asked 3,000 young adults if either of their parents had a same-sex relationship while they were growing up. Result: 175 reported their mother was in a homosexual relationship, and 73 said the same about their father. That’s about 1.7 percent, a figure comparable to other studies. The sampling was so carefully done that it included both those with listed phone numbers and those who only use cell phones (about half the total).
Only 23 percent said they had spent at least three years in the same household with a romantic partner of their mother; an additional 57 percent did so for at least four months.
Among those with a father in a homosexual relationship, fewer than 2 percent said they had spent at least three years in that household. These relationships are much more volatile and short lived, but neither compares with the stability of married heterosexual parents.
Also, by interviewing young adults of homosexual parents, we can see how the experience shaped their adult lives. This is vastly more useful information than asking volunteer same-sex parents if their kids are doing well.  Of course, they say yes.
More results: Three times as many young adults of lesbians were currently cohabiting as those with married parents (24 percent versus 9 percent). Even more young adults (31 percent) of divorced parents were living together. Twice as many from intact homes were employed full time as those with lesbian mothers.
Only 5 percent of those with married parents had considered suicide in the past year versus 12 percent of those with lesbian parents and 24 percent with homosexual fathers. That’s five times those from intact homes. Similarly, a young adult of married parents is less than half as likely to be in therapy “for a problem connected with anxiety, depression, or relationships” – as those with homosexual parents (8 percent versus 19 percent).
Only 12 percent of young adults with married parents had ever cheated while married or cohabiting, but a big 40 percent of adult children of lesbians had done so.
Just 8 percent of those from intact homes had ever been forced to have sex against their will versus 31 percent with lesbian parents and 25 percent of “gay” parents.
These are huge differences.
They should be cited by those opposed to same-sex marriages.
In the last two weeks, I helped gather signatures for a statewide referendum on whether to reverse a vote by the Maryland Legislature legalizing same-sex marriage.
I hope this information will give fresh ammunition to those trying to protect traditional marriage – and children.

Michael J. McManus is president of Marriage Savers and a syndicated columnist.