Posted on 07/01/2006 9:48:22 AM PDT by Mobile Vulgus
This is a perfect example of several current psychoses running through the seedy underbelly of our culture today. This one story reveals the selfishness, stupidity, and hypocrisy of the anti-religious as well as utter lack of knowledge about our nation's history and form of government.
A school board in West Virginia is being sued by two "civil liberties" groups -- read that to mean groups promoting just THEIR point of view, the rest of you be damned -- because the school happened to have a portrait of Jesus displayed in the hallway.
Did I mention it has been there for thirty years? So it isn't just something someone threw up recently.
So, the ACLU and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State have decided that, thirty years after the fact, this whole Jesus thing is all evil and stuff! Imagine the "harm" that has been done lo these many years to children for three decades??
Oh, the humanities!
Now here is the selfishness of the report. This suit was filed by the two "civil liberties" groups on behalf of Harold Sklar and Jacqueline McKenzie, "whose children attended or will attend the school", as the report makes clear. To recap, one parent has kids gone from the school and no longer under the evil glare of that Jesus picture and the other doesn't even have kids IN the school at all!
So, what is preventing the parent whose children WILL attend the school from sending them to a private school that holds better to her atheist line of thinking? Who says she can't move to another school district, one that doesn't have that bad guy pictured on its walls? Maybe this parent might find a school that has a picture of Marx or someone that might hew closer to their anti-religious views?
Still, how is it a support of "civil liberties" to take away a portrait of Jesus to satisfy two people when that portrait obviously didn't offend hundreds if not thousands of others? Are these two people's sensibilities, sensibilities that can be assuaged in a myriad of other ways, more important than that of perhaps thousands of others?
Apparently the Communist founded ACLU and the illogically founded AUSC&S think it perfectly sensible to promote the "feelings" of two people over that of thousands of others.
Yes - a Godless one.
If you mean "Godless" in the sense of not having any intrinsic religious content, then I suppose so. If you mean "Godless" in the sense that it is in opposition to religion, then you are incorrect.
There are good points to the method. I was dated a lady that ran one of their schools. A lot of kids get a lot out of it. OTOH, if you look at their philosophy, it does mirror the policies that a lot of people post as the same "evils the liberals are pushing on the public education system".
I don't know... A lot of the Montessori method is based on individualism; a lot the complaints I, at least, have about the public schools are collectivism.
But if the complaint about public schools is the lack of religious content in them -- which does seem to be the complaint about the Montessori methods here -- then I suppose the complaint some are making here would also be a complaint about public schools.
Note, however, that anyone sending their kid to a private school has some sort of problem with public schools.
Ooopse... Lot, not Abraham. Genesis 19. King James, oddly, translates the word as "bow," but in Hebrew it is the same word translated as "worship" in the decalogue. The King James bible frequently switches how it translates words so no-one catches the contradictions in James' politically motivated theology.
I would also note that John worships an angel in Revelations. The angel redirects him, so it's true that his action is not commended. On the other hand, John is in paradise, before the future throne of grace itself, having seen the Lamb of God in all His majesty; while the angel redirects his worship, it can hardly be supposed that John here has committed the grave sin of idolatry!
Again, John commits no sin. He worships before an angel whose will is the same as God's; it's just that John is (perhaps not quite grasping it at first) in the presence of Christ Himself.
To "worship" or "bow," however it is translated, connotes that the worshipper is placing himself in the service of the worshipped. Just as a soldier who bows before a Centurion has not turned his back on his allegience to Ceasar, one who bows before a servant of God commits no idolatry.
It should be noted that the Catholic faith does not permit praying to, or bowing before anyone who has not been recognized as a Saint. In fact, that is precisely why Catholics declare people Saint. It means more to Catholics than what Protestants take it to mean; it means that the person *recognized* as a Saint is certainly in Heaven, having united his will entirely to that of God's. Were this not so, the Catholic would sin. (And yes, some Americans have let some Protestantism rub off on them, and decided that they can know who is a Saint, not understanding what it means to be recognized as one.)
The one exception is this: In the performance of Mass, it is fitting that people should bow before the priest; the worship is not of the priest, but of the role which the priest is playing, representing Christ at the Last Supper. Again, this is why the AmChurch's liberal preists sin so gravely when they make themselves the focus of the mass; they rob the honor due only to God, and doing so confuse the congregation's understanding of what it is they are doing when they bow. Formerly, the priest used to stand before the tabernacle, holding within it the physical presence of the body and blood, soul and divinity of Christ in the flesh. Absent the tabernacle, it is less apparent that the people are bowed to Christ, and not the priest.
Are you seriously claiming that the UCC is a Christian denomination?
I suspect that there have some Christians still there, as do the ECUSA and the PCUSA, but institutionally, it has abandoned the essential tenents of the faith.
I hope all the parents who complain about the portrait coming down ensure their kids are at church every Sunday. That would be more helpful to your childrens development in religion more than any portrait can do.
"Sure looks like Christians want to have a Culture War even if they have to work both sides."
Actually, the problem with your analysis is that the "Christian" group suing to get rid of the picture are not acting in their religious role, but their secular one. So, it doesn't matter if they happen to be Christian or not as it has no part in their position.
They claim otherwise. From the non Christian viewpoint, this appears to be a conflict within the Christian community...or a staged event.
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Not really. I can disagree with Baptists about the need for immersion or Lutherans about the nature of the elements while recognizing that they hold to the essentials of the faith.
But when a group starts denying the divinity or bodily resurrection of Christ, or starts to reject the scriptures, then I can legitimately question whether or not they are Christians even in the broadest sense.
There are no portraits of Jesus... or paintings either..
No. Calvinists, for example, draw heavily from the teachings of Augustine.
The reformation wasn't as much about new teaching as it was about rediscovery of the old. Remember, Luther didn't want to start a new church, but to confront new error in the Roman chuch.
I don't accept or reject the specific meaning of the text. I'm not moved by spirits or demons...I'm not a Christian.
Then you might find yourself quite at home in some of the more 'progressive' UCC or PCUSA congregations.
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