Posted on 12/09/2014 7:17:40 AM PST by wagglebee
“There is no right and wrong!” the angry university student said loudly, storming up to our campus pro-life display.
“Is that right?” my friend Caleb said slowly. The student came to an abrupt stop, realizing, perhaps for the first time, that his worldview was, in philosophical terms, an “argument to commit suicide.”
That anecdote is illustrative of how we’ve been letting the Cultural Left get away with murder. I’m not just referring to the institutionalized destruction of life in the womb or the “mercy-killing” of the old, but also the broad cultural acceptance—including among Christians—of two stupid and dangerous ideas that have allowed the Left to dominate the cultural discussion for decades.
Christians have not been losing in the public square because we do not have the arguments to respond to the New Moral Revolution of the Cultural Left. We have been losing because we have not been making those arguments, or have not been making them articulately enough.
First, Christians are told loudly, we can’t legislate morality.
I could point out that this argument is inevitably used to justify the legality of something blatantly wicked and immoral, like abortion. Yet, I’ve heard countless Christians tell me that while they are pro-life and do believe in Christian ethics, they don’t think trying to impact public policy or bring our message to the public square is useful because “we can’t legislate our morality.”
They’re forgetting something: All laws legislate morality. All laws are put in place because of a value judgement that something should be permitted, restricted, regulated, or banned. When Christians leave the discussion, all we’re doing is ensuring that it is someone else’s code of morality that is being enshrined into law, and someone else’s values are being used as the guiding principle for governance.
If we don’t fight for the lives of pre-born children and demand legal protection for them, for example, we’re not ensuring that the government won’t legislate morality; we’re allowing those who claim that the right to destroy human life at whim exists and is moral to seize and win the day. Eventually, the government will be paying the butchers with our own tax dollars—because a New Morality has been legislated, and ours has been definitively replaced.
A very brief look at the news cycle reveals that the Cultural Left, while silencing Christians with the demand that we cease trying to “legislate our morality,” is attempting to do precisely that. When they howl that gay marriage should be legal and accepted, they are demanding this because they say it is right and good and moral. They are stating that to deny marriage to homosexuals is discriminatory, and therefore wrong. And the solution to this, they tell us, is for the government or the courts to step in and ensure that this wrong is righted, that this injustice is corrected.
It is not that they don’t think morality should be legislated. They simply think that Christian morality should not be legislated.
Which brings me to the second argument the Left has used to silence Christians: That morality is subjective, if it even exists at all. In other words, it’s okay if you believe that, but that only means its right for you. Other people must remain “true to themselves” and do “what’s right for them.”
This is obviously nothing short of profound stupidity, but a brief jaunt on to any university campus will show you that the number of those who believe that morality does not exist (while simultaneously calling fracking and Christian ethics evil) is staggering. I’ve engaged in dozens of debates that went something like this:
Student: “Well, there is no morality.”
Me: “Okay. Do you think rape is wrong?”
Student: “Of course rape is wrong!”
Me: “Why?”
Student (nervously): “Because…you can’t just force yourself on someone.”
Me: “Says who? You’re appealing to a moral law, which necessitates a lawgiver. Who says that is wrong?”
Student (relieved to have found an answer): “The government! It’s illegal!”
Me: “While I’m glad you’ve found your source of morality, wouldn’t you agree that laws have been wrong before? What about slavery? Segregation?”
This is to illustrate, of course, that morality cannot be subjective, or it is not morality. Right and wrong cannot be subjective, or they cease to exist. Appalling crimes like rape and murder should be illegal, because they are immoral. Christians would argue that they are immoral because God, the Lawgiver, has said they are. The Cultural Left cannot claim that banning abortion, for example, is immoral—because they cannot claim anything is immoral. Inevitably, their claims that something is or is not immoral is based on one thing: How they feel about something. (When they appeal to science, they are again being fallacious: Science, of course, can only tell us what is, not what ought to be. Science can reveal to us observable truths, but cannot provide us with correlating value judgements.)
Christians have not been losing in the public square because we do not have the arguments to respond to the New Moral Revolution of the Cultural Left. We have been losing because we have not been making those arguments, or have not been making them articulately enough. We’ve often bought the laughable lies that morality simultaneously does not exist, and cannot be legislated. Both of these lies are simply a means of keeping us from fighting for what is right in the public square. In many cases, we’ve vacated the battlefield. It’s time to engage like never before—because as we see with abortion, assisted suicide, and euthanasia, lives literally depend on it.
Not all have! Not my Church, not my Pastor and Not Pastor Cruz!
http://media.perpetuatech.com/watch?v=MDFERjZDOTcyMw#
If the current Republicans fail, I’m done. I’ll focus my time and energy on what comes later.
This subject makes me so angry, I can’t see straight. I tried for YEARS to help instill values in public school children and can count on the fingers of ONE hand the number of adults who tried to give me support. I simply don’t want to hear it anymore from ANYONE. Administrators constantly accused me of putting “politics” in the classroom. People are getting exactly what they deserve for failure to stand up and defend those trying to do what is right.
Bookmarked.
No, with John-John and Francisco Franco, Jimmy Hoffa and Jim Varney.
Who are the religious leaders of today? Does any one of them have the character and ability to replace those of times past?
You posted: The article assumes that you are dealing with a rational being and that your arguments will sway Liberals/Progressives/Atheists. It has been shown many times that Liberals/Progressives/Atheists are anything but rational.
Discussing anything with Liberals/Progressives/Atheists is like trying to put a cloud in a box.
***
I don’t disagree with any of your statement. However, even liberals do think and understand, despite their apparent lack of reason. In the quietude of their rooms, or perhaps sitting on the toilet, statements of reason can creep in, and they have to admit to themselves if no one else, that what has been pointed out to them is right. We must never stop presenting our arguments of reason. They sow seeds of reason in those who hear them, which eventually may bear fruit.
Argument:
IF ‘Paul’ wrote that Christians should lead lives, and be the evidence of things, to make the rest of the world envious to poseess what they see in Christians ....
How does a Christian accomplish that, when they keep their mouth shut?
Was it not Christians that talked back against slavery?
was it not Christians that talked back about Communism, causing so many to find a truth hidden, and then the strength to get out of a devilish system?
We have come to live in a time where to say anything that IS wrong, is to say something heretical.
We have come to a time in America, where one does not wish to lose what they have, what they do, or what defines them, in the face of: “Yeah? You and what army?”
From what I remember, Christianity ain’t about what you got in your pocket, or over your head, or what you are just about to shove in your mouth. I believe that it is written that if you do what you are supposed to do, as it has already been defined in the book, those things will be covered. It might not be a Maserati, a four bedroom home, or a filet mignon on your plate with the trimmings, or that omega on your wrist, but you will be taken care of, in faith. Elijah had crows bring him food. Remember that.
As long as you keep your mouth shut about what you believe, you can’t get anyone to come closer to get the rest of the story.
So by not voting you’d vote Obama?
Makes a whole lot of sense! Especially if you want to win elections.
I’m by NO MEANS a GOP fan. I’m more Tea Party than anything. Still, the fact remains, those who didn’t vote cost CONSERVATIVES the election. Lesser of two evils so to say, you don’t see it that way fine....I don’t see it your way.
So you stayed home and voted Obama by not voting?
LOL! Oh so you know me more than myself?
So you make it your business how I vote?
You’re brilliant!
Your understanding of politics in the United States is remarkably identical to Karl Rove’s.
After all - conservatives “have no other place to go” than the GOP, right?
Because of YOUR attitude, the GOP feels free to nominate those who violate the principles which make so many people conservative - and then they (and you) denigrate those conservatives that preserve their own integrity by standing up for your principles.
I pity you.
I wish you’d bring an interpreter when you post.
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