Posted on 11/10/2006 1:22:09 PM PST by madprof98
Richard John Neuhaus writes:
This is but an addendum to Robert Miller’s fine reflection on the meaning of hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is not easy. It is a very deliberate and specific practice that takes some working at. To cite a recent instance, the revelation that German novelist Günter Grass—lauded for years as the conscience of his country—willingly served in the Waffen-SS may qualify as hypocrisy. For decades he relentlessly insisted that anyone tainted by Nazism should be excluded from the moral community of public discourse, knowing all along that he was complicit in what he condemned in others. He was lying. He obviously did not believe what he said he believed and demanded that others believe.
As Miller points out, the case of Ted Haggard is very different. An oddity in much commentary on Haggard is the insistence that he denied who he really is. This is the mortal sin of being “in the closet.” The pertinent text countering that way of thinking is Romans 7:13–20:
Did that which is good then bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment become sinful beyond measure. We know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin. I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. So then it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil that I do not want is what I do. Now, if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me.
Note that carnal and flesh as used by St. Paul do not refer only, or even chiefly, to sexual sins. The carnal and fleshly is all that is opposed to the Spirit of God.
In tones of adolescent rage and petulance, which is the characteristic gay voice, commentator after commentator has accused Haggard of hypocrisy, insisting that what he claims to see as his sin is, in fact, his true self, and demanding that he embrace his sin as his authentic identity. At the core of such commentary is an adamantly binary view of sexuality—one is either straight or gay, all the way. This completely ignores findings otherwise celebrated by proponents of sexual liberation, such as Kinsey’s scale of 1 to 5 in heterosexual/ homosexual orientation. Much more important, it is a naive indifference to the reality of the conflicted self, which is the subject of all great spiritual and psychological writing, as well as the best of the novels and dramas of our civilization. Gay propagandists have room neither for St. Paul nor Hamlet.
Another oddity is that gay and gay-friendly commentators assume that any publicity involving homosexuality—whether Ted Haggard or the Florida congressman who flirted with male pages—works to the benefit of their cause. This strikes me as highly doubtful. A congressional predator or Haggard’s liaisons with a male prostitute hardly enhances the public image of gayness. Of course, there are adult men who prey on girls and there are plenty of female prostitutes. But most Americans live in a heterosexual world where such deviance is recognized as deviance. Almost all the people they know do not prey on girls or patronize prostitutes.
But what they do know about the gay world? Largely the sleaze that comes to the surface in public scandals. There was an op-ed in Wednesday’s New York Times asserting that 70 percent of Americans personally know someone who is gay. That seems statistically improbable. Somewhere between 2 and 4 percent of American males identify themselves as gay. (The figure is much lower for women.) Most of them are congregated in cities, and in those parts of cities known to be gay-friendly. Chelsea and the West Village, along with the Castro district of San Francisco and counterparts in other larger cities, are not America. Gays live in such places precisely because they are not America.
Admittedly, young people in college, or at least in most colleges, do know personally people who are gay; and some of them they count as friends. Most campuses have special-interest LGBT groups, and students are indoctrinated in gay ideology under the rubric of opposing “homophobia.” At one Ivy League college, faculty members told me over dinner that one-third of the male students were at least “experimenting” with homosexuality. Among the women, there were also a large number of “LUGS” (Lesbian Until Graduation). Whether such developments will significantly increase the percentage of adults identifying themselves as gay or lesbian will, I suppose, be discovered in due course. Apart from an intuition for the natural built into human beings, there are all kinds of incentives and pressures militating against such a significant increase.
What most Americans know about being gay is distinctively unattractive and, in their view, morally repugnant. Gay advocates deceive themselves in thinking that the more people know about homosexuality the more they will approve of it. Moreover, it is self-evident to such advocates that gay trumps straight. If a Ted Haggard is by every indicator a good husband and father of his children, and also a preacher who teaches that homosexuality is morally disordered, but occasionally falls into sin and consorts with a male homosexual, it is obvious to such advocates that he is not a good husband and father but is gay. And a hypocrite to boot.
This is a self-serving illogicality that is not likely to convince anyone not captive to the gay ideology. I expect most people will continue to hold with the maxim to hate the sin and love the sinner. To the gay insistence that they love the sin and hate only those who call it sin, they will respond with St. Paul’s much more profound—dare I say nuanced?—understanding of the conflicted self.
Haggard was willingly seduced by Satan. He was in sin before he started fooling around with prostitutes and drugs. He was seduced by the favors of the world. Satan just called in the bill.
Someone asked me if this could cause people to leave that church. I said I sure hoped so. These moments are the times when the sheep are separated from the goats.
read later
Ready to cast the first stone, I see.
I'm not. I've got enough sins of my own to worry about, before I go around condemning Haggard.
In one family that I know of, there is a third cousin, a second cousin, a cousin, and a parent who are either gay or bisexual. And none of these people are closely connected... they may have seen each other once every seven years or so at family gatherings.
I don't know what explains the high numbers in this group. And conversely I do know of other families where there are no gay family members.
I think all statistics should be set aside for now, because nothing seems to be conclusive.
The problem is that Ted chose the East
Gen 13:10 And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the circuit of Jordan, that it was all well watered (before Jehovah destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah,) like the garden of Jehovah, like the land of Egypt as you come to Zoar.
Gen 13:11 And Lot chose all the circuit of Jordan for himself. And Lot journeyed east; and they separated themselves from one another.
Noble but not Biblical when it comes to church leaders. we are supposed to test them and reject them.
1Jo 4:5 GNB
(5) Those false prophets speak about matters of the world, and the world listens to them because they belong to the world.
1Ti 1:3 GNB
(3) I want you to stay in Ephesus, just as I urged you when I was on my way to Macedonia. Some people there are teaching false doctrines, and you must order them to stop.
He's bleeding -- throw another rock!
FWIW, in terms of sexuality, Haggard was teaching true doctrine, not false, his personal sins on the matter notwithstanding.
Should he have been removed? Of course. But you're condemning him beyond that, and it's not your job.
The problem is that you are arrogating the keys to Hell and death to yourself, which you must know our Lord retained. I am prepared to forgive Ted Haggard the moment he asks for it (I think he already has, actually, and has made a pretty full and very public confession). What more he should do I do not know, but I ask that you consider him a fallen human, ergo, just about the same kind of creature you are yourself and I am myself. I do not throw stones here, nor make any allusion, so no one should draw any. We are each and every one capable of sin, and in extremity, great sin. We cannot know what will be the besetting sin that trips us up. All we really know is that our Lord gave His life on the Cross as an oblation for the sins He knew and knows we commit. He loves us anyway and He ordered us to love one another as He loves us.
Please do so, Appy.
God bless.
My guess is that an even larger percentage know someone who is an alcoholic. The difference is that the alcoholic goes to AA to try to stay straight.
This is a self-serving illogicality that is not likely to convince anyone not captive to the gay ideology. I expect most people will continue to hold with the maxim to hate the sin and love the sinner.
That's really tricky. If he were caught with a woman we might hate the sin and love the sinner, but wouldn't call him a good husband and father.
Nothing like a quick dose of Cheap Grace. Instead of calling him into account and making him responsible for his actions, we just throw out a quick forgive to someone who never hurt us in the first place. Imagine a friend coming to you and saying "I've done somethingreally bad and..." and you blurt "Whatever. It doesn't matter. I forgive you. Bye". We have started confusing "I don't care" with "I forgive"
The reason why Ted is in so much trouble is because we are too quick to brush off sin in our leaders. We aren't doing them any favors.
Obviously not. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit.
Pardon my noticing, but isn't he publicly disgraced, fired from his VERY lucrative preaching post and basically consigned to pervert hell in the minds of most irreligious Americans?
That sounds pretty harsh on any standard, unless you're intending to move to corporal punishment, just to make sure he doesn't miss the point.
Sorry. To assert Cheap Grace, you have to be assuming I'm saying he can have his ministry back, just like that. I'm not and I don't. And he would be forgiven, the sin would not be forgotten.
There's the distinction.
But Father Neuhaus's point is not that the public should forgive this guy for sinning against God and his family. The point is that gay activists have been chanting "Haggard = Bad Homosexual, McGreevy = Good Homosexual" because the former Governor, unlike the preacher, claimed (a) he was only following his nature and (b) thereby justified such behavior for himself and for others. To the extent anyone believes this madness, our society is the worse for it.
Saint Paul's letters are bad, then? After all, you can read what he said in Romans 7....
You might consider checking your eyes for planks, friend.
First Things' blog, like the journal itself, is always worth reading.
Yeah, perhaps that was the problem. Lucrative preaching job should be an oxymoron. You shouldn't get rich selling the work of the Holy Spirit. How many other lucrative preaching positions are secretly in trouble? How many of them will be relieved when they see the quick cheap grace extended to Haggard?
Haggard never did anything to me so I don't need to forgive him. But we need to raise up some Nathan's to keep these leaders in line. Too many of them are shearing the sheep. Haggard sold one doctrine and demonstrated another. What is an unSaved man doing selling Salvation?
Paul was unSaved in your eyes?
73.4% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Sigh. Are you suggesting that Mr. Haggard is beyond salvation?
Please. The sheep should not blindly follow the wrong shepherd. Haggard is a wake-up call for the new big box cheap grace church in America.
I do pray that Haggard comes out with an awesome testimony after we turn him over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh.
Of course not. The Blood is more than sufficient. But we allow me to share with you a few words:
Let us go forward, then, to mature teaching and leave behind us the first lessons of the Christian message. We should not lay again the foundation of turning away from useless works and believing in God; of the teaching about baptisms and the laying on of hands; of the resurrection of the dead and the eternal judgment. Let us go forward! And this is what we will do, if God allows. For how can those who abandon their faith be brought back to repent again? They were once in God's light; they tasted heaven's gift and received their share of the Holy Spirit; they knew from experience that God's word is good, and they had felt the powers of the coming age. And then they abandoned their faith! It is impossible to bring them back to repent again, because they are again crucifying the Son of God and exposing him to public shame. God blesses the soil which drinks in the rain that often falls on it and which grows plants that are useful to those for whom it is cultivated. But if it grows thorns and weeds, it is worth nothing; it is in danger of being cursed by God and will be destroyed by fire.
(Heb 6:1-8)
Note: I didn't write that.
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I don't brush it off, and I don't think anyone else here is saying that either.
Then perhaps you should reel in your arrogant presumptions about being Haggard's appointed judge.
"What is an unSaved man doing selling Salvation?"
First, "Thou shalt not muzzle the ox as he treads out the corn". It is no problem whatsoever for the preacher to be paid for taking on the yoke of ministering to the flock.
However, that is the minor point. The larger one is the quote I titled. Consider that St. Paul said "I know there is a crown laid up for me." That is, there is Salvation awaiting him, but he also says "I have run the race to the finish", meaning that now that he is about to die and assuming he dies still fully committed to faith in Jesus Christ, then the crown of Salvation will be granted him. I suspect many read this passage to say that Paul knows he is Saved. For instance, I suspect that I Cor 9:24-27 is used for this exact purpose, to relate the notion of the crown to something Paul can know he has achieved, once he has [kept] under his body and [brought] it into subjection. After all, he is worried 'lest that by any means when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.'
I can see how that sounds like the proper justification for judging and disposing of Ted Haggard. Did not Paul elsewhere also say "Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou has heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us. This thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me;of whom are Phygellus and Hemogenes." Paul also writes that he has given an unworthy preacher over to Satan. Read literally that says, if a ministering brother prove false, then reject him utterly.
But we cannot do so with Pastor Ted, Appy. How many times are we to forgive a brother who asks for it, seven times seven? 'Jesus saith unto [Peter], "I say not unto thee, 'Until seven times', but 'Until seventy times seven."' [St. Matt 18:22) Pastor Ted has repented, he has admitted fault, he has by this admission acclaimed the Word to be supreme and not affected by his own falseness: the Lord will be true even if all men are false, and Pastor Ted has affirmed this. That is, to me, the necessary element for forgiveness. So I grant it, gladly.
One further point I feel constrained to make: I cannot assent to the notion that any of can know we are Saved. I do not believe Paul thought that, though many of his texts in isolation lean that direction, even Romans 7. But you make the correct corollary that arises if Salvation could be known before death: such a person could not henceforth sin. Against this I cite Romans 7:14-18. Paul says he knows what is the right thing (that is, he knows what God has expressed as His will and what He has not) but he admits he knows not how to do it. That says to me that he knows, even after years of self-rebuke, immersion in God's word, preaching it in season and out, he can still sin.
So can Pastor Ted. So can you. So can I. We cannot KNOW we are Saved. We live in hope, we affirm our faith and we seek His grace but we also hold ourselves low, for such things as passing judgment on another man unto damnation in the face of his clean and evident repentance is beyond our skill and outside what God has assigned us to do, no matter who we are.
Now, what about those who presume to preach but who defy repentance, say many of the clergy in The Episcopal Church? I see their apostasy as a far worse sin than any of the lusts so graphically, luridly and morbidly assigned to Pastor Ted. They revel in their defiance of God's clear word and presume to strike I Tim and II Tim from the Bible by avoidance rather than having even so much courage as to literally eliminate those texts. There they still stand in Episcopal bibles, open rejections of the path that church has taken. I think that these folk openly reject the notion that there is anything for which they need to consider repenting and, as such, I have warrant to do with them as Paul did with the apostates of his time, to give them over to Satan and consider then excommunicate.
I hope that this discussion clarifies the distinctions here and pray fervently that you find the charity to accept Pastor Ted's repentance and apology. He may have a terrible time ever ministering in any official capacity again, but his own experience with grievous sin, if gracefully understood and used as a tool to teach abstinence and faithfulness to God could also prove a powerful ministry in and of itself. We never know how God intends to make use of us for His purposes and we err if we presume to dictate what those purposes and means could be.
God be with you, brother.
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