Posted on 03/24/2008 10:50:42 AM PDT by Between the Lines
Decries "dominance of an agnostic or even a materialistic approach to life which causes anxiety amongst believers"
GENEVA, March 20, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A leader of the Russian Orthodox Church has called for worldwide inter-religious dialogue on human rights and denounced the "dangerous" anti-life and secularist trends in human rights thought. Human rights, a concept brought into Europe by Christianity, has been subverted by a small group of activists and civil servants who have imposed an atheist or agnostic interpretation.
Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kallingrad spoke for many Christians outside the Russian Orthodox Church when he told the 7th Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva this week, "For Orthodox Christians something which is obvious is that human dignity cannot be conceived of without a religious and spiritual and moral dimension".
"Human rights," he said, "should not contradict moral norms."
He called on the highest councils of the UN to include religious views on human rights in their deliberations. Metropolitan Kirill, whose full name is Vladimir Mikhailovich Gundyayev, serves as the Chairman of the External Church Relations Department of the Moscow Patriarchate.
Kirill referred to the assumed "right to abortion" that neglects the "right of the embryo" and pointed out that current human rights thought makes no reference to ethics of embryo research. "It's even more astonishing to hear that human rights should now include the right to euthanasia," he said.
A major flaw of human rights theory is in the interpretation of the idea of freedom, in which the "right to choose" is defended, but "nothing is said about humans' responsibilities". The result of this separation is that "the freedom of the individual from evil is left undefended."
"Human rights," he said, "are based on the most fundamental right of all, that is the right to life and yet soon it might turn out that human rights are favouring death rather than life."
The perceived need to promulgate the concepts of universal human rights to people of differing religious beliefs, has led, he said, to the segregation of human rights thought from the religious beliefs that formed it.
The result of this segregation, he said is that "religious views have become a private matter and are not seen as a source of modern law, including human rights, and this is happening despite the fact that according to widespread information some 80 per cent of the inhabitants of the planet are religious."
This progression has led "to a dominance of an agnostic or even a materialistic approach to life which causes anxiety amongst believers."
Krill emphasised the movement away from a religious foundation by human rights theory has "caused anxiety" among religious people, who make up 80 per cent of the human population.
"Many States," he said, "are also under the influence of these forces and they are losing the ability to translate the authentic values sought by their peoples."
Amen
And who decides those ‘moral norms’?
Christian religious leaders, of course.
Are you happy with the Supreme Court and the UN deciding them now?
[...]
"..Let us recall the fact that atheism and the denial of the human person, his liberty and rights, are at the core of the Marxist theory. This theory, then, contains errors which directly threaten the truths of the faith regarding the eternal destiny of individual persons. Moreover, to attempt to integrate into theology an analysis whose criterion of interpretation depends on this atheistic conception is to involve oneself in terrible contradictions. What is more, this misunderstanding of the spiritual nature of the person leads to a total subordination of the person to the collectivity, and thus to the denial of the principles of a social and political life which is in keeping with human dignity. ...
[...]
"..We are facing, therefore, a real system, even if some hesitate to follow the logic to its conclusion. As such, this system is a perversion of the Christian message as God entrusted it to His Church. This message in its entirety finds itself then called into question by the "theologies of liberation."
[...]
"...As a result, participation in the class struggle is presented as a requirement of charity itself. The desire to love everyone here and now, despite his class, and to go out to meet him with the non-violent means of dialogue and persuasion, is denounced as counterproductive and opposed to love.
If one holds that a person should not be the object of hate, it is claimed nevertheless that, if he belongs to the objective class of the rich, he is primarily a class enemy to be fought. Thus the universality of love of neighbor and brotherhood become an eschatological principle, which will only have meaning for the "new man", who arises out of the victorious revolution. ...
[...]
"..But the "theologies of liberation", which reserve credit for restoring to a place of honor the great texts of the prophets and of the Gospel in defense of the poor, go on to a disastrous confusion between the poor of the Scripture and the proletariat of Marx.
In this way they pervert the Christian meaning of the poor, and they transform the fight for the rights of the poor into a class fight within the ideological perspective of the class struggle. For them the Church of the poor signifies the Church of the class which has become aware of the requirements of the revolutionary struggle as a step toward liberation and which celebrates this liberation in its liturgy. ...
[...]
"..The new hermeneutic inherent in the "theologies of liberation" leads to an essentially political re-reading of the Scriptures. Thus, a major importance is given to the Exodus event inasmuch as it is a liberation from political servitude. Likewise, a political reading of the "Magnificat" is proposed. The mistake here is not in bringing attention to a political dimension of the readings of Scripture, but in making of this one dimension the principal or exclusive component. This leads to a reductionist reading of the Bible.
Likewise, one places oneself within the perspective of a temporal messianism, which is one of the most radical of the expressions of secularization of the Kingdom of God and of its absorption into the immanence of human history.
In giving such priority to the political dimension, one is led to deny the radical newness of the New Testament and above all to misunderstand the person of Our Lord Jesus Christ, true God and true man, and thus the specific character of the salvation he gave us, that is above all liberation from sin, which is the source of all evils. ..
[...]
"...Faith in the Incarnate Word, dead and risen for all men, and whom "God made Lord and Christ" is denied. In its place is substituted a figure of Jesus who is a kind of symbol who sums up in Himself the requirements of the struggle of the oppressed.
An exclusively political interpretation is thus given to the death of Christ. In this way, its value for salvation and the whole economy of redemption is denied. ...
[...]
"..For them, the struggle of the classes is the way to unity.
The Eucharist thus becomes the Eucharist of the class. At the same time, they deny the triumphant force of the love of God which has been given to us.
[...]
"...the source of injustice is in the hearts of men. Therefore it is only by making an appeal to the moral potential of the person and to the constant need for interior conversion, that social change will be brought about which will be truly in the service of man.
For it will only be in the measure that they collaborate freely in these necessary changes through their own initiative and in solidarity, that people, awakened to a sense of their responsibility, will grow in humanity.
The inversion of morality and structures is steeped in a materialist anthropology which is incompatible with the dignity of mankind.
[...]
".. the overthrow by means of revolutionary violence of structures which generate violence is not ipso facto the beginning of a just regime. A major fact of our time ought to evoke the reflection of all those who would sincerely work for the true liberation of their brothers: millions of our own contemporaries legitimately yearn to recover those basic freedoms of which they were deprived by totalitarian and atheistic regimes which came to power by violent and revolutionary means, precisely in the name of the liberation of the people.
This shame of our time cannot be ignored: while claiming to bring them freedom, these regimes keep whole nations in conditions of servitude which are unworthy of mankind. Those who, perhaps inadvertently, make themselves accomplices of similar enslavements betray the very poor they mean to help.
The class struggle as a road toward a classless society is a myth which slows reform and aggravates poverty and injustice.
Those who allow themselves to be caught up in fascination with this myth should reflect on the bitter examples history has to offer about where it leads.
They would then understand that we are not talking here about abandoning an effective means of struggle on behalf of the poor for an ideal which has no practical effects. On the contrary, we are talking about freeing oneself from a delusion in order to base oneself squarely on the Gospel and its power of realization. ...
[...]
~ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (nka Pope Benedict XVI) August 6, 1984
“Wherever politics tries to be redemptive, it is promising too much. Where it wishes to do the work of God, it becomes, not divine, but demonic.” ~ Pope Benedict XVI
“...After all, every normal person wants to help the poor and needy, but helping them at the end of a gun, as the left always want us to do, renders any spiritual benefit inoperative for both parties. .... What we hear from Obama is the eternal mantra of the socialists; America is broken, millions have no health care, families cannot afford necessities, the rich are evil, we are selfish, we are unhappy, unfulfilled, without hope, desperate, poverty stricken, morally desolate, corrupt and racist. This nihilism is the lifeblood of all the democrat candidates, even ‘hope you can believe in’ performers like Obama. When Michelle Obama claims she is only newly proud of her country, she does not exaggerate. In her world as in Obama’s, they believe we are a mess, a land filled with the ignorant and unenlightened, filled with despair” ..." (Fairchok).
The Christian God, that’s who. He is the only reason our rights can be said to be “inalienable”. Our Constitution is in place to guard those _self-evident_ rights.
If our rights came from mere men, they can take them away any time they want. The Constitution would have nothing to guard and would be a meaningless document.
Read The Declaratition of Independence if you don’t get it.
You’re welcome! :)
I know the Declaration...do you? Most people only remember the first few paragraphs but forget the ‘meat’ of the Deceleration is a list of grievances against the crown trampling on the rights of the colonists. Most had nothing to do with religion and the answer as to whether or not their grievances were legitimate aren’t going to be answered in the Bible.
I trust the Constitution only to protect our rights, not to give them. And I do know that our rights are inalienable, but I don’t believe in any god. My rights weren’t given to me by anyone or anything. I have them because I am a rational human being who is able to voice my support for them.
Rights are simple, no one ought to initiate to use of force against anyone else...that’s what they all boil down to. I have the right to free speech because no one has the moral authority to stop me from speaking; I have the right to defend myself because no one has the moral authority to stop me from doing so...etc.
I don’t recognize the right for any authority to justify the use of force against me when I haven’t violated the rights against anyone else. The logical conclusion to your argument is nothing less then a Christian version of Sharia, and we had that already...I think it was called the Dark Ages.
Would that be just you personally or do you equally recognize the rights of others?
Presuming the latter, here's you universal God-given morality, no matter what you believe or disbelieve.
That's a circular argument. Who decides what a "rational human being" is, and whether you're one? You have rights because you'll object if they're taken away? Your very right to object, and to have your objection heard, is one of those rights you're claiming.
Those "first few paragraphs" provide the basis and the justification for the entire document, and indeed for the formation of the republic which formed after independence was achieved, the republic whose structure is defined in the Constitution.
Do the irrational have rights? What about those who are helpless to voice their support for their rights? Do the voiceless have rights? Why?
Rights are simple, no one ought to initiate to use of force against anyone else...that’s what they all boil down to.
Says who? Does it say that in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution?
Then your rights spring from nothing and your philosophy was rejected by the men who founded this great nation.
Atheists and moral relativists undermine everything this nation stands for.
“..I don’t believe in any god. My rights weren’t given to me by anyone or anything. I have them because I am a rational human being who is able to voice my support for them. ..” ~ Rayman
Sorry for the late reply. I had so many pings to go through that I missed yours.
I see you esteem the rational. So do I.
“Evolution by natural selection in the classical sense—unguided, with no transcendent agent to direct mutations along “certain beneficial lines,” as Asa Gray put it, hasn’t a clue about how to explain religion—or mathematics, or philosophy, or our ability to do science, for that matter.
Evolution might or might not be able to account for the complexity of our brains, per se, but it’s mute and powerless to “explain” the higher products of our brains, which are of course by far the most complex objects yet known to us anywhere in the universe.
Many agnostic and atheist philosophers, mathematicians, and scientists have stated this much in frank terms. Our ability to do higher mathematics, for example, was utterly irrelevant to our survival in evolutionary terms—our ancestors needed to know absolutely nothing about topology or fractals, manifolds or tensors, even differential calculus, in order to outwit mammoths and saber-tooth tigers.
Nor did they need to know the profoundly shocking fact (from the point of view of naturalism) that mathematics of the kinds just mentioned is incredibly powerful for understanding the external world—a fact that just cries out for a deeper explanation.
Pinker, Dawkins, Dennett and company are flying into the face of the facts on this one. We can not only do mathematics, but our mathematics actually matches the subtlest details of the external world.
How does this make any sense at all, if we aren’t in a very real sense created in the image of God, the divine mathematician (as Kepler, Galileo, and Copernicus regarded God) who also created the external world?”
~ Ted Davis 3/24/08 Professor of the History of Science
Web page: http://home.messiah.edu/~tdavis/
bttt
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.