Posted on 07/06/2004 5:18:34 PM PDT by buckeyesrule
Robert Reich’s Religion Problem
Witless rhetorical oppositions.
Liberals tend to take umbrage when it is suggested that they are hostile to religion, or to religious people, or to some subset thereof. They have nothing against evangelical Christians, they respond, so long as they do not seek to use the state to impose their faith on others. Some liberals go further, saying that they are religious progressives who advocate a bigger welfare state as an outgrowth of their religious values. (A number of my fellow contributors to the new Brookings Institution book One Electorate Under God? take this approach, including Paul Begala.) I take all these liberals at their word. I do not think that most liberals who passionately dislike the Christian Right are hostile to Christians; they have some political and moral disagreements with conservative Christians. On most of the issues in question, I am inclined to agree with or at least lean toward the views of contemporary Christian conservatives, but there is plenty to debate.
But the phenomenon of liberal religion-bashing isn't imaginary, either. Robert Reich's latest column in The American Prospect is a case in point. It starts out pressing the case for the contemporary liberal understanding of church-state separation and its history in America, and uses this understanding to criticize the Bush administration. (The article is headlined "Bush's God.") He says that "the problem" with "religious zealots" is that "they confuse politics with private morality."
Now I disagree with much of what he has to say, and consider it uncivil to describe advocates of prayer in public schools, a ban on abortions, and other policies Reich dislikes as "religious zealots." (I don't consider myself a religious zealot, although I support several of those policies, and support some of them zealously.) But none of this is especially outrageous or even noteworthy.
But then comes Reich's conclusion:
The great conflict of the 21st century will not be between the West and terrorism. Terrorism is a tactic, not a belief. The true battle will be between modern civilization and anti-modernists; between those who believe in the primacy of the individual and those who believe that human beings owe their allegiance and identity to a higher authority; between those who give priority to life in this world and those who believe that human life is mere preparation for an existence beyond life; between those who believe in science, reason, and logic and those who believe that truth is revealed through Scripture and religious dogma. Terrorism will disrupt and destroy lives. But terrorism itself is not the greatest danger we face. This goes well beyond the common denunciation of "fundamentalism" where that term is meant to describe an ideology that seeks the imposition of religious views on non-believers. (That's what Andrew Sullivan means when he uses the term.) It is a denunciation — as a graver threat than terrorists — of people who believe that the world to come is more important than this world, or that all human beings owe their allegiance to God.
Many millions of Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other religious believers will reject Reich's witless rhetorical oppositions. One can believe in the political "primacy of the individual," the obligation of all people to answer to God, and the wrongness of any governmental attempt to make them answer to Him, all at the same time. But if our choice is between the primacy of individuals and the primacy of God — if, that is, we are to choose between individual human beings and God — then the vast majority of traditional religious believers would have to choose God. I certainly would. That would be the case for plenty of believers who are not sure what they think about abortion law, or want a higher minimum wage. All of us, for Reich, are the enemy.
I will not reciprocate the sentiment. Reich is not my enemy, although I certainly want most of what he stands for politically not to prevail. I don't think we have to have the battle he forecasts. I hope we don't. In fact, I pray we don't.
DONE...
Reich is nothing but a stinking, sawed-off little communist pig. Runt of the litter, no less.
I dunno, look at the garbage spewed by Ramsey Clark. Reich may be like Avis, he's #2 so he tries harder.
Dear elect sister,
i pray you are well.
i did not have time to comment earlier on this thread.
clearly the little gods are raging in defiance of the adopted.
which makes the progress,Lord willing to keep the executive branch intact in novenmber's election.
Re 21:8 But the fearful, and the unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, will have their part in the Lake burning with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.
(MKJV)
to God alone wise be glory through Jesus Christ forever.
Amen
Well if you look at Christianity from a political perspective it is predominantly socialist. It certainly does not have a capitalist bent to it.
And let's not forget it was the Christians who started introducing socialism into this country in the late 1800's
12 Kerberos
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Well said bump..
[Don't forget they introduced both socialism AND prohibitionism into this countries politics in the late 1800's.]
13 tpaine
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This is simply not the case.
If you read the Old Testament in particular you will see in ancient Israel a capitalistic economy, with charity focused on the individual, with a strong belief in private property and the rule of law.
And nothing in the New Testament contradicts it.
Those who say that it's the government's job to care for the poor (meaning, of course, that it's the taxpayer's job) aren't reading their Bible very carefully.
-Zack-
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Zack, you are making a religious point while trying to rebut historical political facts. Both socialistic & prohibitionistic schemes were introduced into American politics by Christian movements in the late 1800's.
-- Its been downhill for our liberty ever since.
Even if we grant that, what does it matter?
I have relatives in the mafia, what does that make you think of me?
When a man chooses to be your enemy, he is, even if you would have amity.
Then you ought to be more blatant in qualifying your statement, because you said, "Well if you look at Christianity from a political perspective it is predominantly socialist. It certainly does not have a capitalist bent to it."
Then you spoke about history. So I felt called to correct your first stament, which is inaccurate.
Prohibition was indeed a largely Christian movement. It was a mistake, and an easily corrected mistake had anyone bothered to consult the New Testament, which doesn't forbid drinking at all - just drunkenness.
But socialism, as a movement - I'm not educated about its origins.
You'll find amongst reformed believers, which were the sort that founded our country, a definite trend away from socialism, and toward freedom, which I believe to be consistent with the Biblical message.
But it is the liberals who have taken issues of morality to the Supreme Court which has ruled on moral issues. Such as abortion on demand.
The immoral laws the Supreme Court has forced on Christians make life intolerable for us living in America. The left knew long ago they had to promote their immoral values through the courts, as voters would never approve of those issues at the ballot box.
It is the liberal left that is to be feared for what it is doing to this country. The courts are usurping the power of Congress who willing give it, as Congress is too spineless to follow the Constitution for fear of the left.
Then you ought to be more blatant in qualifying your statement, because you said, "Well if you look at Christianity from a political perspective it is predominantly socialist. It certainly does not have a capitalist bent to it."
I think that's a fair assessment of general Christian politics of the late 1800's.
Then you spoke about history. So I felt called to correct your first stament, which is inaccurate.
Maybe, but only from a biblical standpoint, and I'm not educated in that field.
Prohibition was indeed a largely Christian movement. It was a mistake, and an easily corrected mistake had anyone bothered to consult the New Testament, which doesn't forbid drinking at all - just drunkenness. But socialism, as a movement - I'm not educated about its origins.
You'll find amongst reformed believers, which were the sort that founded our country, a definite trend away from socialism, and toward freedom, which I believe to be consistent with the Biblical message.
I simply don't know anything about what you call "reformed believers". All I see are the opinions of believers who post at FR, and very few of them have much in common with the politics of the Founders, imo.
Me too. I had an uncle who was in the Purple Gang.
INTREP - Klintoonite
HA! As God decrees the meditation for my son this evening was Psalm 73!
"4 They have no struggles;
their bodies are healthy and strong. [1]
5 They are free from the burdens common to man;
they are not plagued by human ills.
6 Therefore pride is their necklace;
they clothe themselves with violence.
7 From their callous hearts comes iniquity [2] ;
the evil conceits of their minds know no limits.
8 They scoff, and speak with malice;
in their arrogance they threaten oppression.
9 Their mouths lay claim to heaven,
and their tongues take possession of the earth.
10 Therefore their people turn to them
and drink up waters in abundance. [3]
11 They say, "How can God know?
Does the Most High have knowledge?" ...
21 When my heart was grieved
and my spirit embittered,
22 I was senseless and ignorant;
I was a brute beast before you.
23 Yet I am always with you;
you hold me by my right hand.
24 You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will take me into glory.
25 Whom have I in heaven but you?
And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
26 My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever.
27 Those who are far from you will perish;
you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.
28 But as for me, it is good to be near God.
I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge;
I will tell of all your deeds.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness--That to secure these Rights, Governments are constituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed. . . .
Robert Reich espouses that which is euphemistically termed "secular humanism", just down the street from dialectical materialism aka godless communism.
In Reich's world, the sky is red, there is neither Heaven nor Hell, no absolute good or evil, and--this is important now--the highest arbiter of morality is the state.
Recently Hillary Rodham Clinton told an audience that "we will take your tax cut for the common good". The determiner of her "common good" is the elite Left, what Marx and Lenin termed the dictatorship of the proletariat.
In Communist China today it is dangerous to the risk of disappearance and death to be religious. Christians, Muslims, even the harmless Falun Gong meditators are arrested, tortured, beaten, executed as enemies of the state.
So it is with Robert Reich and Hillary Rodham Clinton: those who recognize and obey a higher power than the state are themselves enemies of the state.
It is no coincidence that the co-presidency of William Jefferson Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton armed the Chinese Communist regime with our missile and warhead secrets.
The Chicoms funded the Clintons' re-election.
In 1997 a Chinese Communist official praised Hillary Rodham Clinton as a textbook-perfect example of propagandist, total obfuscation behind bland phrases.
From the late Barbara Olson we know that Hillary's sealed Wellesley thesis was a paean to Saul Alinsky radical counselling, "Tell any lie for power."
Now Hillary is allied with and funded by George Soros multi-billionaire who has sworn to destroy our president and bring down our nation.
Reich is merely a little troll toiling in Hillary's ministry of propaganda, preparing the day when she can bulldoze the churches and become the glorious leader.
To such marxists religion is the opiate of the masses.
To them the highest power is the state, that is, the tyrant who dictates using the empty phrases all tyrants use.
And Reich is doing his part--he may be short, but he's tall enough to kiss Hillary's ass.
Good post Phil, I never realized Reich was so anti religion. This war has already started and people better wake up.
Reich always struck me a a little weasel.
A fine post, Phil!
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