The video above is a little risque and you should not watch it near young children.
One of several reasons why Father Orthoduck has left the Religious Right has been the loss of balance in the beliefs, rhetoric, and logic of those involved in many parts of that movement. The video by Jon Stewart clearly points out how all too many others in the USA view the Religious Right. There is a certain illogic in the demand for the religious freedom while, at the same time, insisting that the USA must run on conservative Christian religious principles, otherwise the Church is being persecuted. There is also a serious exaggeration of what Christians in the USA are experiencing. The reality is that we are not experiencing persecution. We are most certainly experiencing the fact that not all our opinions are being adopted as the way in which this country is run. Frankly, by and large, with a few exceptions, when the various churches strongly oppose some policy applying to them, they win.
Many of you may wish to cite abortion as an imposition upon the Church. We most certainly need to fight against abortion. But the fact that abortion exists is not persecution. No church is forced to perform abortions or forced to accept those who have agreed to or supported or performed an abortion. No church affiliated hospital or physician in such a hospital is forced to perform an abortion. Abortion is an affront to God and must be fought. But, the existence of abortion is not persecution of the Church. It is most certainly a sin and a deliberate disobedience to God. But, its existence is not persecution.
We need to stop using Nazis and Communists as examples of what is going on in this country. Frankly, we are insulting those who really suffered under Nazis and Communists. It is not surprising that a Jewish person (Jon Stewart) felt so insulted by the overuse of Nazi allusions that are present in so much of modern American conservative politics. We do not convince people that they should become Christians or that they should be partners in supporting conservative Christian views when we use rhetoric that is insulting to those who truly suffered under either fascists or communists.
Conservative American Christians need to decide what they want. Do they want a Christian country that runs according to their perception of Biblical standards, or do they wish to argue about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights? Having a Constitution and a Bill of Rights means that we will not win every battle. But losing a legislative battle is not persecution. On the video above a priest comments that he needs to be ready to die for his beliefs. Father Orthoduck thoroughly agrees with that sentiment as an ex-missionary who served in a country in which dying for our beliefs was a possibility. But, this is not that country. No one here will die for their beliefs, so it is totally inappropriate for conservative Christians to speak as though a disagreement is the same as persecution. We are not about to die for our beliefs. And we need to stop using persecution terminology.
Conservative Christians need to make a decision. Will they use exaggerated rhetoric that leaves them hated by those who do not agree with them or will they speak clear and simple truth in order to try to convince those who disagree with them that their thoughts are worthy to be heard?
Fr. Ernesto I like your tone and your use of reason to discuss things in the public square. I have myself like you distancing myself from the religious right. This is not and never has been a “Christian” nation nor do I want it to be. Our role is to freely exercise our faith by way of teaching our children the faith and teaching them how to be citizens of this nation using their rights and privileges to keep our nation a nice place to live. Sadly the consensus on what constitutes civic behavior (Luther called it civil righteousness) is no longer present as it was at the founding of our nation. At that time deists, atheists and Christians held pretty much the same view of what constituted moral behavior (and by the way moral does not equal Christian). I believe this is the rub we are having today. Civil behavior is not longer governed by reason. It is subjective. It is what I believe to be civil and what benefits me rather than what benefits the whole. The churches role in this is to teach our children to love their neighbor and my neighbor is any person in need whether bodily or spiritual needs. Yet, there is something to be learned from Nazi Germany.The Lutherans misapplied Luther’s two kingdoms and mistakenly believed that as long as they could operate within their walls without interference from the government that they should leave government alone. Love for neighbor is what was missing. Bonhoeffer had great pangs of conscience over how to respond to the Nazis and I know this is my words not his but love for neighbor sometimes calls for civil disobedience or even kill the monster. Thank you for your voice of reason. May I copy your words and use them in my church classes.
You are welcome to copy them and even polish them a bit. GRIN.
Certainly, Art, but the United States at this time is not Nazi Germany, nor is it the Soviet Union. For that matter, the U.S. is not Iran. It is not the Peoples’ Republic of China. It is not North Korea.
Should the Federal government retreat tomorrow to the size that Grover Norquist, Jim DeMint, and Rick Santorum would find acceptable, corporate America would step in to fill the vacuum, perhaps by way of dominating state governments. Just look at Wisconsin, for example. Or, this would happen by way of creation of a neo-feudal system dominated by private security forces under the control of corporations. Don’t like dealing with government? Try dealing with a homeowners’ association or some other corporate entity!
At least with government as it now stand in the United States, I do have right and I have a voice. Take away the government, and we will be living in Somalia (even if the American “warlords” wear suits and are corporate executives, it would matter little in the end: just ask someone who has worked for Koch Industries!)
It is always difficult to find a balance between government involvement and government over-involvement.
Thank you. Stewart nailed it. “Persecute my a** like that,” indeed!
The Catholic bishops, whom it was my first instinct to support when this kerfuffle first broke, are apparently planning to expand on the hysteria now, rather than accept the accommodation they’ve been given. See:
“Bishops plan big birth-control battle expansion”
http://tinyurl.com/8yc6v3v
Excerpt:
“And now, they are aiming higher still, lobbying Congress to enact a law that would let any employer opt out of covering any medical treatment he disagreed with as a matter of his personal faith.
So, for instance, a pizzeria owner who objected to childhood vaccinations on religious grounds would be able to request an insurance plan that did not cover them, in effect overriding a federal requirement that vaccinations be provided free with any health-insurance plan.
Leaving coverage decisions up to each employers’ conscience might create chaos in the marketplace, “but chaos is sometimes the price you pay for freedom,” said Richard Land, the president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, who is backing the bishops whole-heartedly.”
It’s ludicrous.
I hope to find out what Fr. Insurance-Rebel Martyr plans to say, for instance, to his Catholic parishioner whose Church of Christ, Scientist employers won’t pay for insurance that covers chemotherapy when he or his kid comes down with cancer.
Need a blood transfusion? Better hope you don’t work for a Jehovah’s Witness.
So, what started out looking like a justifiable objection by the bishops now just looks like an opportunistic election-year political project in concert with the usual Obama-hating forces. It especially looks like this when you consider that for the past 10 years or so, New York and California have had laws that require the same coverage that this new federal measure requires, and the Church has been, as far as I know, in compliance there. Certainly no national campaigns and Hannity appearances featuring self-aggrandizing claims about Readiness for Martyrdom over it. Not during the Bush administration.
Forgive me for the disdain I can’t hide, but while I wanted to take the Church’s side on this at first, I’m finding it very difficult to do so now.
In my opinion, this is shaping up to be a dramatic demonstration of the folly of tying health insurance to employment. Until the day we wake up, collectively slap our foreheads and say, “Private, for-profit health insurance tied to employment? What were we thinking?” and institute the universal single-payer system we’ll inevitably have to come around to, we’re in for nonsense like this, while people get sick and die for lack of health care.
I think I have a problem with the idea that the churches in those states have no objections to the interference by the State. I am very against many of the Tea Party stands. Nevertheless, on one stance I am in full agreement. The State may not require a Church to do anything that violates its beliefs. Note that I do not hold the same opinion as regards individuals and secular corporations. It all has to do with the Bill of Rights. If one claims to be a constitutionalist, then one must live with the idea that opinions with which one does not agree will be approved on a periodic basis.
Nevertheless, you make an excellent point about Christian Scientists and Jehovah’s Witnesses. If you ended up working in a church ministry of one of those groups, then it would be entirely legitimate for that group to deny you certain health coverage on the ground that its beliefs make that coverage an immoral act.
Thanks for posting this. Sometimes I’m not sure that reasoned statements and discussion have any hope of overcoming the overall noise, hysteria, and hyperbole that seems to permeate everything. But hopefully…
How about simply letting me buy my insurance the way I buy a car. I shop for the deal that fits me best and buy it. We only got into the idea of employers providing because of the post world war II wage freezes. Instead of pushing for wages, unions opted for benefits. Now companies cannot afford it. If insurance companies had to compete fairly for customers like auto companies, we would possibly have a better more affordable system.
The problem with that is, health insurance these days is no longer really insurance (except for policies that cover specific things, such as catastrophic events), and this is of necessity. We all need health care, routine and otherwise, throughout our entire lives.
Because of that, competition really isn’t going to make that much difference. What MIGHT make a difference, however, is if the entire country were but one risk pool, as in universal single payer. This is really the only feasible, sustainable solution, and ironically, what the Roman Catholic bishops are now doing, trying to get insurance exemptions for ANY medical treatment an employer finds morally and/or religiously objectionable, simply brings the need for “medicare for all” into greater relief.
If you have an accident and have insufficient car insurance to cover your losses, you are out a car. States require a minimum of insurance in order to make sure that the other car at least gets something. However, if you are injured in that car and have NO health insurance, the law requires the hospital to treat you back to basic health. Since you are likely to be unable to pay that means that we absorb your costs through our insurance and healthcare costs. That is, you are really insured by us.
If health insurance were to be run the way in which car insurance is run, even if you had the cheapest policy, we would still be required to treat you, thus still passing the costs on to us, unlike car insurance. Therefore, it makes no sense to argue that we should not have some type of national health insurance, since we already have a national (federal law) requirement to treat you, whether or not you have money or insurance.
The other option is to adopt the Tea Party attitude of those who shouted “let them die” in an early Republican debate. I would not care to face the Lord with the argument that this is the correct attitude!
Indeed, Father Ernesto.
And, given the way the system is currently set up, if one has no actual health coverage, one is not likely to receive routine and/or preventative medical care, even in the presence of chronic illness. That means that it is far more likely that one will end up in the ER and then, in the hospital, for treatment of an acute, possibly life-threatening, episode, and THAT means that the de facto “coverage” of which you speak (generally paid for, as you know, by over-charging for the care of others that is covered by insurance or is paid for out of pocket by those few who are rich enough to be able to do so) is going to have to pay much more than would have been the case if the person involved had been receiving routine health care all along.
It is a misunderstanding if you think you don’t already pay for the uninsured in your health care. Those that don’t have it are forced to use ERs as primary care facilities, without the benefit of cost negotiations. So they pay more, and then can’t pay. What’s left is passed on to the rest of us.
We need to stop using health insurance as the gateway to health care in this country. Thirty years ago, insurance companies spent much more on health care than on profits and marketing. Now that number is significantly smaller. Costs are going up, but not because health care is becoming more expensive but because they can and do charge more for providing less. And just try to use it if you need it. It’s like trying to get blood from a turnip. My mother works with cancer patients all day long, not providing care (though she’s a nurse) but trying to get insurance companies to provide the coverage those poor patients have already paid for.
Using your car analogy, as the Frs. have suggested…try driving it without insurance. Government said you have to have that, for the same reason you should have to have health insurance. More people in the pool keeps costs down, and minimizes the impact of the uninsured when there is a need to access medical care.
Fr. Ernesto–Thank you so much for your reasoned and compassionate approach. As a former Republican (and fundamentalist Baptist), now left-leaning Orthodox, I used to think that God was really, honestly, the original member of the GOP and that America was, at its core, a true Christian nation.
I am rabidly pro-life. I accept the Church’s teachings on birth control, abortion and chastity. But I know that myself, and my sisters, have been prescribed birth control for reasons unrelated to preventing pregnancy. I know that for my sister birth control kept her from illness. It is not the business of my employer why I may need birth control. It is a matter between me and my doctor, and my priest, should I choose to tell him in this situation. (I have never taken it b/c I was too wary of the side effects).
Now the state of Virginia has mandated that women undergo a completely unnecessary and invasive medical procedure should they desire an abortion. Requiring an ultrasound? OK, fine. But this is not just an ultrasound. This is a transvaginal ultrasound, painful and extremely intimate. This is the state of Virginia saying that the women of their state need to submit what to me sounds like a sexual assault if they chose to exercise their “right” to a procedure that, while abhorrent and immoral, is legal. As a woman, I am horrified. As a Christian, I am grieved.
Why does it seem that the Right in this country, aided by those who call themselves Christian, are hell-bent on protecting their rights to torment vast swaths of the population–altering history education to paint slavery in a positive light, praising the torture of prisoners in the “war on terror,” dismantling regulations designed to protect the environment and those who depend on it, standing against any attempt to control the flood of weapons into American communities, barring access to legitimate health care services (Planned Parenthood) for the poor because the organization performs abortions (so do hospitals), and now forcing women to submit to a sexual assault? Why, how, is this a) Christian and b) pro-life?
I am discouraged, Fr. I truly am.
I have some of the same questions you have but without quite the discouragement. I suspect that part of it is because I have lived in a country that became Communist and because I was a missionary in a country which became a dictatorship of the right. Having experienced that, we are nowhere near close to that type of extreme.
Nevertheless, you have quite a good set of points. The Religious Right and the Tea Party appear to be libertarian when it comes to their rights, but rather oligarchical when it comes to the rights of those with whom those groups disagree.
Yet, abortion is a place in which all orthodox churches have made a stand. Thus, even though only 3% of Planned Parenthood’s budget goes toward abortions, their strong advocacy of abortion is sufficient to place them on the “must stop” list.
I track well with the above post until the last paragraph. So…the citizens of Virginia or the legislature (I am not from VA and don’t know how it came about) passed a law requiring a certain kind of ultrasound and that is the fault of Christians? Sounds like it was the result of citizens voting. So if you want to change that law get your citizens together and try to change it. I have voted for legislation and persons who lost but I don’t blame the “liberal establishment for it” or blame atheists. It is the way we do business. IN Ohio there is a proposed legislation that will make abortion illegal once a heart beat is detected. I will be voting for it for a number of reasons one of which is that our constitution acknowledges a right to life and so it is the governments role to protect life. Like the writer I am that some of my fellow Republicans who may also happen to be Christians seem more concerned about their rights than “love your neighbor”. It is interesting to note that Jesus had next to nothing to say about the rights of a Christian but much to say about sacrifice and love for one’s neighbor.
Arthur–
You missed the point of my outrage at the Virginia legislation. I certainly understand how democracy works, and am quite confident that this will be a tough one for that state’s legislators to explain come campaign season. It was not voted on as a citizenry, but rather through their legislature.
My point is this: A group of largely-male people, the majority of them good God-fearing Christian-folk, decided that they have the right to make a woman undergo a painful and extremely intimate procedure because they can. I understand the desire to eliminate abortions. I share it. But really, is the best way to behave in such an obviously sexually-aggressive fashion, in a way that is designed to remain 1/2 of your constituents that you can, using the arm of the state, humiliate them and sexually assault them, for behaving in a way that is LEGAL. (immoral and evil, but legal)
It is the MOTIVATION and obvious sexual sadism that is behind it that bothers me. It should bother EVERY human being, never mind those who claim to follow Christ.
For the record, I’m a Hoosier. My legislature recently enacted a bill designed to strip unions of their strength, a bill rejected repeatedly by voters’ opinions and one that was not given a hearing at all for the reason of keeping the outrage hidden this year. So it doesn’t matter, Arthur, what voters and citizens want, this democracy is broken and our interests and beliefs are not being acted on. But that’s another topic for another day.
That said, I agree with everything else in your post. We have forgotten the sacrifice thing, and I’m quite sure, when we see true persecution, we will look at this period with embarrassment, for this is not it.
d’uh *remind not remain in the above 2nd paragraph
Very well said, RSG. My position on the Virginia law is virtually identical to yours. I am also Orthodox and against abortion. This law is disturbing in the extreme. Your term, “sexual sadism,” is accurate. It’s ritual humiliation of women.
As for our broken democracy, well, I live in Wisconsin, so tell me about it! Our Republican majority’s abuse of power and contempt for democratic process has been our daily fare for the last year. Seriously, almost every day, there’s more of it, and it’s working in so many directions at once, it’s impossible to keep track of it all. The scandals about covert doings come on top of the many things they’ve done *openly* with brazen contempt for democratic process.
(I wrote here and then deleted a paragraph about some of the scandals tumbling out of our state capitol lately involving our Republican majority. Even today’s news: we have three federal judges, two of them appointed by Republican presidents, slamming our Republican majority “in a blistering order that said Republicans had engaged in an ‘all but shameful’ effort to keep its efforts hidden from the public.” This scandal and others are strong evidence supporting my case, but, as RSG said, that’s a topic for another day.)
All that is not about this “religious freedom” issue regarding contraception or abortion, but it demonstrates how democracy in our state legislatures is crumbling fast, as RSG notes. And that so much of it is being driven by the party that loudly claims to be the champion of Christian values, and that cries “religious persecution” when it doesn’t get its way, is indisputable. Sometimes I hear Orthodox clergy and laity defend these politicians, and I have literally shed tears and lost sleep over that.
So just waiting to see if they can vote out these Virginia lawmakers and maybe vote some in who don’t mandate sexual assault in the form of unnecessary (and expensive) medical procedures isn’t enough. And frankly, even if the majority of the Virginia electorate actually were to support this law, my position doesn’t change. The law is unconstitutional, and sometimes majorities are wrong and need to be corrected. Cf. Jim Crow laws. Democracy is not only what happens in the voting booth, followed by long periods of citizen passivity between elections. No, democracy involves continual vigilance and action.
Has anyone seen any response to this law by Virginia doctors and other medical professionals? I have not been able to find any such statements. I would think that medical professionals would have a lot to say about this. I hope that some of what they say is that they would refuse to comply with this law.
I have been following this very closely as I am a Virginian and an ultrasound tech. Physicians have been testifying at every opportunity that the state is pushing itself between a woman and her physician. Not one single doctor has testified on behalf of this legislation. One of the doctors I work with is a state senator and did graphically explain what was involved in a transvaginal u/s so they are lying when they say that they did not realize what this law entailed. As of this writing, that law has been withdrawn and another bill passed mandating a transabdominal u/s…totally useless for dating an early gestation or for the desired effect of forcing women to view the baby. Again, regardless how you feel about abortion, this law’s sole purpose is to humiliate women and essentially tell them they are too stupid to understand what they are doing. Unfortunately, that is not the only piece of legislation that is coming from the far right. Just last week they voted to overturn a very sensible one-gun-a-month law that was enacted 20 years ago to stop Virginia from being a gunrunner state. Why anyone needs to buy more than one handgun a month is beyond me, but it apparently is infringing on the rights of the wackos to buy lots of guns and run them up to NY. This from the so-called Pro-life legislature. Oh, and there was a personhood law which would grant all rights at the moment of conception despite the fact that 70% of fertilized eggs never result in a clinical pregnancy and this law would make illegal all invitro fertilization and several forms of birth control.
I know there are many people of faith that have very strong feelings about abortion as well as many other social issues but I have a very hard time sometimes because I am of that 50% of the population that was raised secular and very progressive but came to faith as an adult. Many of my prior beliefs and thought processes changed as Christ has changed me and maybe it is just because my gift is compassion and empathy, but I still hold women in at least as high esteem as their eggs. I see the conflicting sentiments of the members of the church and it is very difficult to keep walking the walk but with His grace, I keep putting one foot in front of the other and remember above all things to love my God and love my neighbor and trust Him to work out the details.
Betty, thank you for sharing your insight and knowledge as a Christian health professional on location where this spiteful legislative nonsense has been unfolding. I really appreciate hearing from you.
On the support of gun-running by so-called “pro-life” legislators, oh how I hear you. It’s becoming impossible to count the ways in which the so-called “pro-life” banner is getting wrapped around more and more violence.
God is not mocked.
One of the greatest dangers in this world is when we become so wrapped up in ourselves that we hurt others around us systematically in an unconscious manner. We are talking about a murder. I think it is ok to force someone who is trying to talk themself out of reality to look squarely at the crime. If that humiliates and makes one feel stupid – it should. I for one would be pleased to have someone humiliate me and call me an imbecile rather than stand quietly by while I kill another and try to convince myself that it is ok for any variety of reasonable sounding excuses. “And we know that no murderer has eternal life in them”.
So Blake, let me get this straight. You are in favor of RAPE in order to prevent MURDER?
Sigh.
Ladies and Gentlemen and Good Fr. Orthoduck . . . thank you for this article and the myriad comments which are all so refreshing, balanced, intelligent, rational and, well, sane.
Thank you for letting me realize that not everyone out there is totally and completely narcissistically, pathologically batsh*t crazy.
Thank you. I’ll be reposting this frequently.
Riddle me this…if a transvaginal ultrasound is called sexual sadism what is it called when a short time later the same person has a d and c…done on another human being who did not have a choice. ..hmmmm?What would that be…I wonder.
It is called that one evil does not justify another evil. The evil of abortion does not justify the lesser evil of a mandatory transvaginal ultrasound. The evil of 9/11 does not justify Guantanamo, indefinite detention without trial, and inappropriate interrogation methods.
Father Ernesto,
I cannot thank you enough for holding for this message. I know this is now an old blog but I am writing the “morning after”. I hope my fellow Republicans wake up and stop listening to the Hanidys and the Limbaughs. The credibility we put in these men defies credulity. I would like to think that some Limbites would listen to the video spot that you link to but they won’t. The man has a gift for saying “the King is naked” and some are not ready to hear it.
Also, your point about which do we want a “Christian nation” or a Constitution with a Bill of Rights”. We cannot have it both ways. There is still this damning notion that we are a “Christian nation” which we never were nor will be. Yes, many of the founding fathers were Christians but that does not mean they were orthodox theologians who rightly understood the Gospel. What they all had in common was a common understanding of moral law but not a common understanding of the Gospel. This is where the Lutheran understanding of church/state shines and needs to be studied by all Christians. Art Casci