Posted on 02/14/2012 4:15:53 PM PST by NYer
In the pages of the liberal Jewish Daily Forward, Noam Neusner says that President Obama’s claim that religiously motivated schools and services are not truly religious runs counter to tikkun olam, the Jewish obligation to do good to others:
The Obama Administration has held – and continues to hold – that if a religious institution wants to serve the community as a whole and employ people who do not subscribe to their faith, what they do is functionally not a religious mission at all, but a public one. In other words, you can practice your faith when it applies only to you. When it applies to other people, you can’t. Given the special freedoms from state oversight and control accorded to religion under the laws of our Constitution – freedoms which have served the Jewish people particularly well – this is a significant assertion. [ . . . ]
One wonders whether the political instincts of many liberal Jews will blind them to the underlying challenge to their core religious belief. Especially in the Reform and Conservative movements, tikkun olam has been the rallying cry of countless bar and bat mitzvah speeches and high holiday sermons for decades. Although they may attempt to look past this issue as a problem only for Catholics, they will soon begin to understand its implication for them.
If tikkun olam is to retain any meaning, it must mean what it has always meant: Judaism as a faith is expressed in actions benefitting all of society, not just Jews. It must be defended by these same liberal Jews and liberal denominations against this redefinition by the Obama administration.
Even if they agree with the Obama program for domestic policy, including publicly paid health insurance, on religious grounds, they must fight this. Even if they send checks to Planned Parenthood, they must fight this. Even if they see in Obama’s policy program the work of tikkun olam writ large, they must fight this. It’s one thing to favor policy for reasons of faith. It’s another thing to surrender faith in the process.
Hear hear. One hopes we’ll see more such calls for inter-religious solidarity.
But will he vote for 0bummer again, you betcha.
Catholic ping!
Very interesting. Hopefully many liberal Jews will start thinking more deeply about 0bummer and his policies.
A witness will accompany them into the voting booth to make sure.
Then we can talk
But it's a good point. Obama and Sebelius are arguing that when Christians, or Jews, or Buddhists, or Jains, or Moslems DO GOOD outside of a specific church building, synagogue, temple or mosque then they are simply another secular business.
That is, of course, the argument of Fascist Pigs
For Jews it may mean no rabbis will be allowed to do brit mila, only doctors. Or maybe the entire practice could be banned.
No kosher meat because it has too much sodium and the govt wants to limit that in the interests of health. And of course, everyone will have to accept gay marriage.
> Even if they send checks to Planned Parenthood, they must fight this.
Good luck with that.
Never happen.
With all Liberals and Leftists, Ideology trumps EVERYTHING, even their wives and children, and especially their “faith”, whatever that may be.
“The Obama Administration has held – and continues to hold – that if a religious institution wants to serve the community as a whole and employ people who do not subscribe to their faith, what they do is functionally not a religious mission at all, but a public one.”
Obama knows that many churches won’t compromise on this, so this argument really means that he wants those churches OUT of the business of providing these services. The commies will celebrate if Christian schools shut down rather than comply. That’s a bigger win for them than getting a few more people free birth control pills.
Obama thinks he is slick with this move right out of the Alisnky “community organizer” playbook. If you are the one instigating the debate, you can help shape the outcomes, so that either way, you benefit. Obama thinks, if the churches comply, he is a hero to the left for fighting for “reproductive freedom”. If the churches fold, he is a hero for shutting down the Christian brainwashing schools.
Someone made a good comparison on another thread, and I apologize for forgetting who so I can’t credit them. Basically, they pointed out that Obama’s position is saying, you have freedom to practice your religion only behind closed doors, amongst others of your religion. Once you step out in public, you have no religious liberty. Under that definition, we’d have about as much “freedom of religion” as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Hmm, and how long before they declare that kosher butchery is “cruelty to animals” and say they must comply with some USDA-approved procedure instead of their tradition? After all, kosher butchers don’t sell ONLY to Jews, so they are offering a “public service”.
You also forgot that all those Kosher delis will now have to sell pork sandwiches.
You also forgot that all those Kosher delis will now have to sell prk sandwiches.
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