Posted on 12/10/2009 8:01:33 AM PST by steve-b
First let me say a word in praise and defense of my former boss, my professor, mentor and friend Ron Sider. I need to start off with this affirming word because by the end of this post--and in the one to follow--I'm afraid I'm going to have to be rather harshly critical of my old friend.
...I have enormous respect and affection for Ron Sider, so much so that my regard for him is able to withstand even something like his dismaying endorsement of the overwrought, corrupt and corrupting "Manhattan Declaration."
In partial defense of Ron, though, we should note that his signature and support were secured under false pretenses. It seems he was lied to....
The Manhattan Declaration was created to threaten these younger evangelicals to get back in line with the precise priorities of their elders.... When talking to The New York Times' Laurie Goodstein, Colson is much more candid about this than he seems to have been when suckering Ron into pulling a Lieberman:
The signers... say they also want to speak to younger Christians who have become engaged in issues like climate change and global poverty...."Paramount." "Hierarchy." "These are the three most important."
"We argue that there is a hierarchy of issues," said Charles Colson, a prominent evangelical who founded Prison Fellowship after serving time in prison for his role in the Watergate scandal. "A lot of the younger evangelicals say theyre all alike. Were hoping to educate them that these are the three most important issues."
That's three ways of saying the exact opposite of what Sider was led to believe.
So, yes, I think that Colson lied to get Ron to sign on and that Ron fell for it....
(Excerpt) Read more at slacktivist.typepad.com ...
In the Museum of Disjointed Trains of Thought, this article will stand on a pedestal near the front door.
Never pull a Lieberman. You get dirty and Joe enjoys it.
Steve-b, you left out the alert
....The organizers of this right-wing manifesto du jour needed a token liberal to provide a bipartisan fig-leaf, so they turned to Ron Sider (about as close as the evangelical world allows to a liberal) to be their Lieberman. But to convince him to play this role, they had to lie to him. I don't know which or how many of the declaration's three author-organizers did the actual lying. My money would be on convicted felon and would-be domestic terrorist Chuck Colson. (Yes, terrorist. Plotting to burn down the Brookings Institution in order to silence opposition from centrists is political terrorism.)
Sider is a marxist-socialist, pure and simple, who espouses UN population control and government wealth redistribution. He runs in the same circles and advocates the same kind of liberation theology that Jim Wallis and Tony Campolo do.
In the great commission, Jesus did not command his followers to picket abortion clinics. He told them to go into the world and make disciples, baptize them and teach them to obey him. That's the most important thing.
Jesus never led a protest march to call Herod out for having John the Baptist executed... or even demanding his release before his death. Paul never led a grassroots movement demanding that Caesar stop gladiatorial games.
In my humble opinion, it is because Christians shirk their duty to evangelize that these problems (abortion, homosexual behavior, euthanasia, etc) become so pronounced.
Please don't get me wrong. Abortion is evil. Homosexual "marriage" should be stopped in its tracks. But these are not the most important issues facing Christian churches today. Evangelism and Discipleship are.
Well, then, they probably shouldn’t have let him sign at all — and certainly should not have lied to him to persuade him to sign on.
Chuck Colson didn't lie to Ron Sider. Sider, in spite of his left-leaning redistributionist beliefs, is still an evangelical believer who understands homosexual behavior to be immoral. He is misguided but not evil. Those who would impose homosexual marriage on the US are evil. They have goals that go beyond their stated motivation of "equal rights for gays." They wish to destroy any influence evangelical Christianity has in the US. It is THEY who are lying to the well-meaning-but-misguided Ron Siders within Christianity.
Read the full article, as you have obviously failed to do.
Exactly correct. They assume that since Sider shares their views on "feeding the world," that he must share their views on encouraging open homosexual behavior, which he does not. Anything that he signs that encourages believers to stand up against homosexual marriage must have been deceptive, since he signed it. Twisted logic, but it is the way leftists think.
Btw, Jim Wallis and Tony Campolo both believe homosexual behavior is sinful as well.
???
Was this "document" something he could READ before signing?
It is simply incorrect to say that the people involved in the Declaration are one-issue or two-issue (or even 3 or 4-issue) narrow-gauge zealots. Consider the principal authors:
Chuck Colson is a tireless advocate for prisoners and for people who are on the margins of society. His work has been of enormous spiritual and physical benefit to many who struggle and suffer most: drug addicts, convicted criminals and their families;
Dr. Robert George currently serves on UNESCOs World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology (COMEST), and has taught and written extensively against torture and war crimes, and argued against forced marriage, the oppression of women, and sexual trafficking on the basis of Natural Law;
Rev. Timothy Beeson points out that the dignity of life and of marriage as proclaimed in the Gospel "touch on everything else we do including the proclamation of the Gospel, concern for the poor, nurturing of children, ministry to prisoners, care of creation, and peacemaking in a broken world."
On these matters, the esteemed Ron Sider is surely acting in full awareness and agreement with the authors and the other signers of the Manhattan Declaration. They have challenged us to see the full dimensions of the Gospel, and I say "Bravo" and God bless them all.
I myself would be consumed with shame and indignation if I were to be perpetually judged by some of the the ignorant rubbish I expounded on in the 1970's.
Sider has admitted his mistakes and learned from his critics since then. We should be more just in our judgments: let's give him credit for allowing himself to be changed by accurate criticism. It's a virtue all of us would do well to acquire.
I, personally, think Clark is engaged rhetorical monkeyshines here.
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