Posted on 02/14/2010 6:30:49 PM PST by tcg
The moment Barack Obama was elected to the Presidency of the United States, Radio/TV commentator Sean Hannity began a steady drumbeat of calls for a "conservative" revolution. Soon, he will release his plan for America. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich is leading a group of "conservatives" in releasing what they will call a "Conservative Manifesto" at the CPAC convention next weekend.
Make no mistake, I am NOT a liberal. Nor am I what is masquerading as "progressive" these days. I would welcome a debate over whether the so called "right" to reach into wombs and kill our youngest neighbors and to give homosexual practice equal legal status to marriage is really "progressive" at all. I contend that those claiming the label "progressive" are really "regressive."
I am 55 years old. An aging "former hippie" whose rejection of the misguided values of a consumerist, secularist culture led me to re-embrace the Catholic Christian faith, I looked forward to hearing one of my favorite old rock groups, the Who, at the Super Bowl. They tried hard to summon up their aging voices at that Half Time Show. I rooted for them. I was struck with the haunting words of one of their songs, "We don´t get Fooled Again." I am afraid we will be fooled again if we buy the idea that a "conservative revolution" is the solution to what is needed in this nation.
The collapse of Western civilization will not be remedied by "conservativism" or "neo-conservativism." They are inadequate for the task. Crippled by the lies of the culture of death and indoctrinated by what Pope Benedict XVI rightly called a "Dictatorship of Relativism", we need so much more. We do not need a "conservative revolution" we need a Christian revolution.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholic.org ...
Christian Revolution is the wrong word, I agree. But we could have another Christian revival. We don’t KNOW that we are at the End Times. There have been many revivals throughout history, including especially the Great Awakening in America, and it could happen again, if God so wills.
It’s not something we can do by ourselves, although God uses human instruments to bring about His will.
The author, as he himself stated, passed from being a “hippie” to being a confirmed Christian. I guess in that process, he has never looked at what Conservatives really stand for.
Conservatives are not simply for “individuals” or extreme individualism, as he believes. When individuals are truly free, they will give their loyalty to their families, to their churches, and their social organizations. These are the best social “safety nets” and the strongest bonds of a stable society. An activist Government interferes with all of these. That is why an activist Government is fundamentally anti-family, and anti-Christian.
Sorry I’m still not into a theocracy. The separation between church and state in our country started out over a split with the puritans in the 1600’s. It is still important. The official church of the colony persecuted catholics, Jews, and everyone else who didn’t walk their puritan line. The person who insisted on this concept was a minister and left Virginia for Rhode Island and religious freedom. Now how did that get blamed on everyone else????? The church and state connected thing has been tried here before. It didn’t work.
%100 correct . This is nOT a theocracy nor will it ever be.
One of the things the founding fathers rejected was a state mandated religion I.E. The Church of England. They did not, However, deny religious freedom. In my opinion government should never be based on any religious belief. We can see even today what a disaster that approach is.
Of course we know we’re at the end times. All of the signs point that way. Technology, signs in the earth, lawlessness, sinfulness, globalism, Jews being hated across the globe (even by people in the US), etc.
Social justice is fine if it is directed by the principle of
subsidiarity. But I rarely see Catholics promote that. They reverse the order of which level of society should address a problem for the most trivial things. Its a foundational teaching is it not? Why do Catholics not stress it as they do other basic teachings such as social justice?
????? Where’s your logic??????
Probably Thailand has the most porn, It certainly is the child sex capital of the world and probably perversion capital of the world and I think it is majority muslim.
Second guess would be Brussels, which threw off the chains of Christianity decades ago and where groups of men fly to Thailand to have fun with the boys. Also, it probably is the center for porn production.
Imperialist Japan was especially brutal, sexist and immoral; the military was largely homosexual and women were treated worse than dogs, worse than any woman in Western societies. Didn’t they worship the sun god?
India’s cast system (Hinduism) was a far worse society for the masses and especially women and children than any Western Civ country. You would never have wanted to be from the lower castes in that society. It was worse than being a slave in the U.S. I would have loved to been burned in a pyre when my husband died.
In fact, Aztecs and Mayans and other Indian tribes were probably far worse than any of the eastern nations. There were cannibals, incest, pederasty, polygamy, child sacrifice, extreme torture, rampant homosexuality. Of course, they had no magazines and computers.
The buggery of young boys, although especially rampant in Ancient Greece and Rome (Pagan?????)cultures, (along with women being no more than slaves), probably was a much better place for people to live than the above or any Arab countries, especially if you were a woman or young boy. Although I wouldn’t have wanted my son to be a (pagan) Spartan because if he wasn’t killed at birth because of some defect, he would have been taken under the wing of an older male mentor to be initiated into homosexuality for cohesion in the ranks of the army which he was forced to join.
You missed my point! Cicero lived BEFORE Christ— duh!!!..my point is that in societies that had some order (like Aristotle’s, King Solon’s in Greece), the great concepts that were part of Western Civilization took centuries to form the most perfect country in the existence of the human race for the most diverse nation in the world. Our Founders were the most brilliant, well educated men of their time and knew of all the failings of every society and the ideas of Cicero and Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas.
In ancient Western civilization although they were pantheists, they realized there was a Law of the Universe. Cicero called it Natural Law and God’s Laws where he stated that any (Roman) Law that went against Natural Law and God’s Laws were unjust. That was a brilliant concept that was meant for all citizens (although there were slaves, etc. where it didn’t apply).
The fact that all nations had slaves, particularly the Arab nations, probably doesn’t mean much to you, but those concepts of slavery being evil came exclusively from Christians, like Wilberforce. Western Civilization eventually got rid of slavery. It still exists in Muslim nations and African nations and Asia and the poverty is so intense in a lot of South American countries, they live like slaves.
That, along with the brilliant Aristotle, were the basis of Thomism which aligned all Catholic thought to Natural Law. But I wasn’t referring to Catholicism, but to Christianity which, because it broke away from the Catholic Church, was much more similar to Catholicism than any other type of religion. Protestant religions were the dominate ones in the founding of this nation, but those religions were based on lots of the theology developed through the centuries by the Catholic Church.
Tribal religions were never egalitarian. The other tribes were enslaved. Women were owned and polygamy was usual. Some regaled in homosexuality, canabalism, incest, buggery, etc. VooDoo and nativism is still a religion in a lot of places. I believe muslims are whiping out the Christians and enslaving and raping them, but I just read few articles coming from there.
Rampant pornography only happened in the US AFTER the sexual revolution and AFTER the homosexualist Kinsey’s work was promoted by the Progressives to destroy the morals in this country (destroy Christianity). His book was published in the 50’s. The Progressives removed all restrictions (morality codes in place until the 60’s) (Catholic Church was responsible for the morality codes) and they took God out of the public schools in the 50’s and replaced the moral absolutes with moral relativism and VOILA!!!! you had the sexual revolution. Hugh Hefner was allowed to flourish. You had immoral ideas being sanctioned in movies and pumped into the minds of young kids and the “feel good, do it” model of the 70’s. The handing out condoms in the schools, so what do you expect?
This article is to get back to our roots as a nation when the majority of people practiced restraint, stayed in their marriages so they could raise decent kids, and filled the Churches up on Sundays. They put family ahead of immediate gratification, and at least attempted to obey the ten commandments.
By the way, the baby rape capital of the world is South Africa.
I could fill this space up with millions of examples of how Western Civilization, infused with Christian thought, brought about the most happiness for the most diverse peoples, men, women AND children, ever in the history of mankind. No other society has done this. It is the greatest social experiment so far and it was because of the ideas of Christianity and Natural Law (which includes private property, etc) that made it so successful.
I seem to recall that Judas was rather in favor of a “Christian” revolution.
God does not think in our ways.
Actually, we don’t think in His.
Do you people pray for our nation?
We need to act as individuals before acting as a nation.
What is this author suggesting , conversion at gunpoint?
Its well meant, but just too simplistic.
2 Chronicles 7:14
if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
You are right. We can not with the first amendment be a theocracy and that is a good thing. We could not be a free country if we forced people to belong to a Church. It would denigrate the religion also, if they believed in Free Will.
But our rights in this country come from God, so we should teach that in schools. That should be constitutional. We should also base everything we teach on Natural Law and God's Laws and moral absolutes (from the Bible) because that is the basis of our legal system. That is not establishing a religion.
Atheism should not be allowed promotion since it denies where our rights come from (therefore, man could take them away). Darwin should be taught as a theory but intelligent design should be given equal space as long as our Constitution exists.
Having said that, Christ even said something to the effect that we should know more than just the signs of the weather, but signs of the times. A nation that even resembles the USA is not mentioned one time Revelation, Daniel, Ezekial, etc.
You are mis-representing many facts about India...
Since I was born and grew up in India, I might know a little more about India than you.
India has become much more prosperous since it discarded theocracy and declared itself secular. Some of the highest posts in government have been held by persons from untouchable castes. Widows burned on pyres was rare even in old days. I do not know of a single incidence of such burning in my family tree going back 12 generations. Now it is non-existent and against the law.
During my college years in India, I did not know the castes or care about them about my fellow students. The only time caste system came into play was for marriage. That was decades ago. In the Christian United States race based discrimination was much more prevalent and overt in comparison. Any one remember Whites Only water fountains? Blacks could not even eat in a restaurant as recent as 1950’s in the south.
Thailand might be the prostitution or perversion capital of the world, I couldn't say. Bangcock certainly has a bad reputation. However, Thailand isn't in Africa, and it was African nations that you were lambasting for being in chaos because of (among other things) "rampant sexual immorality." (BTW, Thailand is majority Buddhist, with a very small and violent Muslim minority in the south).
Once again, what proof do you have that the sexual immorality in African nations is any worse than what we have in the US or elsewhere? May I suggest that their social chaos, such as it is, may have more to do with their relative poverty and poor leadership?
As for the rest of your post... please don't misunderstand me. I'm all for Western Civilization, even though I find other civilizations interesting and worthy of study. I think Western Civ is a "good thing"; however, I think Christianity is a much better thing. What I find tiresome and false are functionalist "defenses" of Christianity which reduce it to being just something that ensures that civilization or society doesn't fall. Christ is about the salvation and redemption of sinners like you or me, not the salvation of societies or empires or civilizations.
To 22 - Well put sentiments, and nary a word in your post that couldn’t have been stated by Thomas Jefferson.
I am focusing on organization of cultures/societies. Throughout history, if there is no commonality among the people, there can be no trust, no progress, no safety. (My Nigerian philosopher explained that moral relativism creates chaos-- never works and he explained what it was like to do business (bribes) in his country. What made all the diverse groups work in the US was that most of the people that immigrated to this country was familiar with the Bible and had moral absolutes and they are the ones who wrote the Laws.
Immorality in all societies will happen, especially if the government encourages it--welfare system. Our legal code, based on Natural Law and Christianity, was the closest thing to perfect in the history of the world for a large group of people. It is inevitable with the nature of man and the Will to Power that evil will always exist. But what system of government is best for survival and happiness of people?
If that means praying while shaving than, so be it.
Lord, have mercy on us as a nation and stir up our hearts to seek you out in all things. Lord, I pray that you will stir up the hearts of the lukewarm so they would listen to you and turn so you would heal them and our nation.
In Christs name.
That description fits 75% of New England Catholics.
I'm not sure that you do.
What about S. Africa being the baby rape capital of the world?
What about it? The Dutch and British settlers who started colonizing South Africa back in 1652. Their missionary efforts have born fruit: the 2001 South Africa census lists almost 80% of South Africans as being Christians. Over 3 million South Africans are Roman Catholic; by comparison, the number of adherents of traditional African religions is miniscule: 125, 898 (less than 1% of the population).
Religion in South Africa (2001)
How do you explain this? If the mere presence of Christianity and Western Civilization -- both of which have been present amongst the European/immigrant and aboriginal populations for centuries in South Africa -- is sufficient to make a society happy and moral and free from abuses, then why hasn't this combination worked for the South Africans?
Glad to hear somebody believes in our Constitutional REpublic and the rule of law. Unlike the secularists who think the law says whatever they say it means.
If everyone who opposes Roe v. Wade and gay marriage is considered a theocrat, then count me in with them.
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