Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts
Monday, September 25, 2023
Monday, May 3, 2021
Friday, June 5, 2020
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Two Senses of "Religion" and the Danger of Denying Them
Introduction
There are two senses to the word "religion." The first sense comes from the belief that it is true. The second comes from the belief it is not true. The importance of being aware of both senses is important to avoid the loss of religious freedom.
The first sense of the word is the sense of the believer. A religion makes claims about the nature of reality that impacts everybody whether they believe it or not. For example, if God exists, then the atheist worldview (which denies the existence of any type of divinity) must be false. If Jesus Christ is God in the sense that Christianity believes Him to be, then logically the religions that claim He is not must be false. That's the law of non-contradiction at work. It lets us know that truth exists about the accuracy of religious claims—which means we can find out truth about religion if we choose to seek it. And once we find it, we live in accordance with it. That's a binding requirement of everyone, whether they believe in a religion or not.
The second sense is the sense of how one who does not accept a religion as true can approach it. One can know about a religion even if he or she does not accept it as true. In this sense we can know about religion as an organized understanding of how people believe the universe works and how they believe people should live in it. Whether or not you believe a particular religion to be true, one can understand what the beliefs are and not be jerks about not believing the claims. For example, if I invite Rabbi Cohen to dinner, I don't prepare a meal of ham. If I know it's Ramadan, I don't invite a Muslim coworker to meet over breakfast. I don't believe the Jewish dietary law and the Muslim fasting are binding on me, but it is respectful not to put the believer of a religion in a situation where he has to choose between his beliefs and his friends or business etc.
So in the first sense, Religion teaches us to conform to the reality it reveals. In the second sense, we are respectful of a religion we don't agree with because we recognize it has behaviors which members voluntarily take upon themselves because they feel obligated. Even when we believe their behavior is wrong (as opposed to a difference of opinion), we behave like civilized people in doing so.
The Failure to Respect Either Sense Leads to Persecution
Unfortunately, in modern society there is a growing tendency to reject both aspects of religion. Basically, there is no interest in seeking out the truth and no interest in respecting the conscience of believers. This has the result of doubly violating the freedom of religion.
In denying freedom of religion in the first sense, it is believed that there is no binding truth, therefore no person can claim that there is an obligation to behave rightly when doing so goes against the edicts of the state. There is a right way to act, because truth exists (for example, if the fetus is a person then it can never be right to kill the fetus by abortion). But if one denies the obligation to live according to truth, then moral obligation is seen as nothing more than personal preference. Opposing the legality of abortion is seen as no more reasonable than not eating pork. So the person who believes abortion is wrong is accused of "forcing your views on people." Even if a majority of Americans should happen to believe Christian morality is true, trying to pass laws that reflect that belief
In denying religious freedom in the second sense, our nation has de-evolved to the bigotry we claim to have moved beyond. Who gives a damn if the Catholic believes he can't support paying for contraception? Who gives a damn about a Muslim or Jew believing he cannot eat pork? If your religious beliefs interfere with my whims, then your religious beliefs must be opposed!
Logical Errors that Lead to Ignoring the Consideration of Truth
Whenever the appeal to religious freedom is made, one common response is to deny that the obligation to live according to what is true has any binding force, and deny that practitioners of religious practices can believe themselves bound to such a practice. These denials root themselves in a belief that "Well I don't believe in what you think, so why should laws exist that tell me I can't do what I want?"
Another response is an appeal to fear. The Sharia is mentioned (for example the behavior of ISIS/ISIL). Or perhaps the Satanists want a monument to counteract the Ten Commandments in front of a courthouse. The argument is, "You wouldn't want to give these things authority over you. So don't try to put your own beliefs into law."
The problem is, both of these objections overlook the obligation of seeking the truth and living in accordance with it. Two hundred years ago in America, many people simply refused to consider the question of whether enslaving people was moral, even though 400 years before that, religious teaching had condemned it. In America, we know now that slavery is wrong—very few people think otherwise. But the fact is, if we go by the (lack of) logic that rejects a moral claim because of its religious origin (that's the Genetic Fallacy by the way), then we have to reject the opposition to slavery on the grounds that it is imposing a "religious view" on others.
Just because a person personally disagrees with a law because of they see a religious motivation, does not make that law merely a "religious law" that is unjustly imposed on others. The murderer, the rapist and the thief may think laws against murder, rape or stealing should not be imposed on them. Regardless of whether one believes that murder is wrong because of the Ten Commandments or for some other reason, it is reasonable for a law to exist that forbids and punishes murder . . . it doesn't matter whether you're a Christian, a Buddhist or an atheist. So when Christians believe abortion should not be legalized, the response is to ask whether their claim about the human person is true.
As for an appeal to fear like the imposition of the Sharia or the erection of a Satanic statue on the Steps of an Oklahoma Courthouse, what we have is the fallacy known as the Category Mistake. One thinks these are the same thing as the religious freedom and moral obligation Christianity calls for. But they are not the same thing.
The general objection to the Sharia is not the fact that it teaches that a thing is wrong, but the fact that it mandates punishments we consider unjust. There's a difference between saying "we must stone an adulteress to death" and saying "abortion kills a human person." Likewise, the reason we can reject the erecting of a Satanic statue is because the purpose of it is not the same as the erection of the Ten Commandments. The erection of the Ten Commandments in front of a courthouse basically makes the statement that there is objective good and evil. It does not show preferential treatment for Christianity. But the Satanic statue, on the other hand, is erected to be confrontational—basically it's the same bad behavior as the cretins from the Westboro Baptist Church who show up at the funerals of people who died from AIDS or while serving in the Persian Gulf. In both cases, the presence is intended to distress people whose behavior or beliefs they disagree with.
Understanding the Implications
When we recognize religion in the first sense, it makes sense that people who share a sense of right and wrong will want to see the government reflect that sense. Provided they do so in a civil way, in compliance with the law and do not use coercion on others, they have this right under the First Amendment (Freedom of Religion and the rights "of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.")
Recognizing religion in the second sense means that when members of a religious minority believes they are obligated to avoid doing certain things that they believe to be evil, the elites in power do not force them to do these things.
Recognizing and respecting these senses of religion are the difference between a truly free country and one that is not free. Unfortunately, today, America is falling into that second category. I don't say that as an exaggeration. We behave differently than the cases of totalitarian nations, yes. But it is a difference of degree, not of Free vs. Not Free when it comes to religion.
Two Senses of "Religion" and the Danger of Denying Them
Introduction
There are two senses to the word "religion." The first sense comes from the belief that it is true. The second comes from the belief it is not true. The importance of being aware of both senses is important to avoid the loss of religious freedom.
The first sense of the word is the sense of the believer. A religion makes claims about the nature of reality that impacts everybody whether they believe it or not. For example, if God exists, then the atheist worldview (which denies the existence of any type of divinity) must be false. If Jesus Christ is God in the sense that Christianity believes Him to be, then logically the religions that claim He is not must be false. That's the law of non-contradiction at work. It lets us know that truth exists about the accuracy of religious claims—which means we can find out truth about religion if we choose to seek it. And once we find it, we live in accordance with it. That's a binding requirement of everyone, whether they believe in a religion or not.
The second sense is the sense of how one who does not accept a religion as true can approach it. One can know about a religion even if he or she does not accept it as true. In this sense we can know about religion as an organized understanding of how people believe the universe works and how they believe people should live in it. Whether or not you believe a particular religion to be true, one can understand what the beliefs are and not be jerks about not believing the claims. For example, if I invite Rabbi Cohen to dinner, I don't prepare a meal of ham. If I know it's Ramadan, I don't invite a Muslim coworker to meet over breakfast. I don't believe the Jewish dietary law and the Muslim fasting are binding on me, but it is respectful not to put the believer of a religion in a situation where he has to choose between his beliefs and his friends or business etc.
So in the first sense, Religion teaches us to conform to the reality it reveals. In the second sense, we are respectful of a religion we don't agree with because we recognize it has behaviors which members voluntarily take upon themselves because they feel obligated. Even when we believe their behavior is wrong (as opposed to a difference of opinion), we behave like civilized people in doing so.
The Failure to Respect Either Sense Leads to Persecution
Unfortunately, in modern society there is a growing tendency to reject both aspects of religion. Basically, there is no interest in seeking out the truth and no interest in respecting the conscience of believers. This has the result of doubly violating the freedom of religion.
In denying freedom of religion in the first sense, it is believed that there is no binding truth, therefore no person can claim that there is an obligation to behave rightly when doing so goes against the edicts of the state. There is a right way to act, because truth exists (for example, if the fetus is a person then it can never be right to kill the fetus by abortion). But if one denies the obligation to live according to truth, then moral obligation is seen as nothing more than personal preference. Opposing the legality of abortion is seen as no more reasonable than not eating pork. So the person who believes abortion is wrong is accused of "forcing your views on people." Even if a majority of Americans should happen to believe Christian morality is true, trying to pass laws that reflect that belief
In denying religious freedom in the second sense, our nation has de-evolved to the bigotry we claim to have moved beyond. Who gives a damn if the Catholic believes he can't support paying for contraception? Who gives a damn about a Muslim or Jew believing he cannot eat pork? If your religious beliefs interfere with my whims, then your religious beliefs must be opposed!
Logical Errors that Lead to Ignoring the Consideration of Truth
Whenever the appeal to religious freedom is made, one common response is to deny that the obligation to live according to what is true has any binding force, and deny that practitioners of religious practices can believe themselves bound to such a practice. These denials root themselves in a belief that "Well I don't believe in what you think, so why should laws exist that tell me I can't do what I want?"
Another response is an appeal to fear. The Sharia is mentioned (for example the behavior of ISIS/ISIL). Or perhaps the Satanists want a monument to counteract the Ten Commandments in front of a courthouse. The argument is, "You wouldn't want to give these things authority over you. So don't try to put your own beliefs into law."
The problem is, both of these objections overlook the obligation of seeking the truth and living in accordance with it. Two hundred years ago in America, many people simply refused to consider the question of whether enslaving people was moral, even though 400 years before that, religious teaching had condemned it. In America, we know now that slavery is wrong—very few people think otherwise. But the fact is, if we go by the (lack of) logic that rejects a moral claim because of its religious origin (that's the Genetic Fallacy by the way), then we have to reject the opposition to slavery on the grounds that it is imposing a "religious view" on others.
Just because a person personally disagrees with a law because of they see a religious motivation, does not make that law merely a "religious law" that is unjustly imposed on others. The murderer, the rapist and the thief may think laws against murder, rape or stealing should not be imposed on them. Regardless of whether one believes that murder is wrong because of the Ten Commandments or for some other reason, it is reasonable for a law to exist that forbids and punishes murder . . . it doesn't matter whether you're a Christian, a Buddhist or an atheist. So when Christians believe abortion should not be legalized, the response is to ask whether their claim about the human person is true.
As for an appeal to fear like the imposition of the Sharia or the erection of a Satanic statue on the Steps of an Oklahoma Courthouse, what we have is the fallacy known as the Category Mistake. One thinks these are the same thing as the religious freedom and moral obligation Christianity calls for. But they are not the same thing.
The general objection to the Sharia is not the fact that it teaches that a thing is wrong, but the fact that it mandates punishments we consider unjust. There's a difference between saying "we must stone an adulteress to death" and saying "abortion kills a human person." Likewise, the reason we can reject the erecting of a Satanic statue is because the purpose of it is not the same as the erection of the Ten Commandments. The erection of the Ten Commandments in front of a courthouse basically makes the statement that there is objective good and evil. It does not show preferential treatment for Christianity. But the Satanic statue, on the other hand, is erected to be confrontational—basically it's the same bad behavior as the cretins from the Westboro Baptist Church who show up at the funerals of people who died from AIDS or while serving in the Persian Gulf. In both cases, the presence is intended to distress people whose behavior or beliefs they disagree with.
Understanding the Implications
When we recognize religion in the first sense, it makes sense that people who share a sense of right and wrong will want to see the government reflect that sense. Provided they do so in a civil way, in compliance with the law and do not use coercion on others, they have this right under the First Amendment (Freedom of Religion and the rights "of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.")
Recognizing religion in the second sense means that when members of a religious minority believes they are obligated to avoid doing certain things that they believe to be evil, the elites in power do not force them to do these things.
Recognizing and respecting these senses of religion are the difference between a truly free country and one that is not free. Unfortunately, today, America is falling into that second category. I don't say that as an exaggeration. We behave differently than the cases of totalitarian nations, yes. But it is a difference of degree, not of Free vs. Not Free when it comes to religion.
Friday, August 15, 2014
Friday, May 23, 2014
Two Attitudes. Two Questions. Two Considerations
Two Attitudes
I have noticed two common attitudes towards religion who try to avoid thinking about it.
The first is the attitude of indifferentism. Indifferentism is basically the attitude that all religions are pretty similar and the differences between them are minor quibbles that don't matter as long as we are all "nice" to each other. (Never mind the fact that what qualifies as being "nice" differs from religion to religion).
The second is the attitude of skepticism. Skepticism also looks at all the religions and sees the differences. The attitude of the skeptic is to look at all the differences and say, "we can't know which one, if any, is true so it doesn't matter if we just opt out of choosing."
These two attitudes—two sides of the same coin—make a universal conclusion out of the differences. Either they are insignificant or insurmountable and therefore religion doesn't matter. Accept or reject religion as you like.
Two Questions
I think these two attitudes can be addressed by two questions. For the Indifferent, the question is:
How do you know they're all equally valid?
For the skeptic, the question is:
How do you know they're all equally unimportant?
Two Considerations
The fact that there are different religions and that they say different things is not a matter of indifference. If there is a right way and a wrong way to do things, then one cannot reasonably say that it doesn't matter what way is chosen. Indifference is a positive laxness that does not think that the differences mean anything. Therefore one is as good as another. But just because the indifferent person sees the differences as unimportant doesn't mean that the differences are unimportant. In the world of law, thinking differences are unimportant and ignoring them can get a person in trouble if the person enforcing the law discovers you chose the wrong understanding of what is right.
This also applies to following God—if God has made known how He wants His followers to follow Him, choosing any old way to act is acting wrongly. Consider the rebellion of Korah in Numbers 16, or the rebelling of Aaron and Miriam (Numbers 12). This was not a matter of indifference to God.
Dr. Peter Kreeft has used this example. Imagine a mountain with many roads going upwards. How do you know they all reach the top? The wrong path will not get you to the desired destination. So if one path is the path God has made (John 14:6) and the others are manmade, then the indifferent attitude that holds that one path is as good as another is a dangerous one indeed.
The skeptic takes an attitude of negative laxness. It too looks at the differences in the claims but, unlike the indifferent, the skeptic sees the contradictions and concludes that we can't know if any of them are true so we can safely ignore all of them. But when you think about it, does that attitude really make sense?
If you should go to a foreign country and are not sure what the traffic laws are, it would be foolish to head out on the road while thinking it doesn't matter if you choose to follow none of them. You would soon be before a judge. You couldn't plead "I didn't know so I thought it wasn't important!" The judge would ask why you didn't bother to at least try to seek out the rules.
Conclusion
Now you may ask me, "with all the competing views, how can I begin to find the right path?" (Now if you ask me personally, I'll try to save you some time and say, "It's the Catholic Church." But since I presume you meant, "How do I search for the right path…?" read on). The answer is, you need to seek out what is true—which means discerning what is true as opposed to what pleases you or what you want to be true.
A lot of people stop at "What gives me pleasure" and never asks whether what feels good is actually good. People get caught up in destructive relationships, alcohol, drugs, etc. They can't see beyond the pleasure and thus can't see that they are not searching for what is truth. Self delusion and fear of losing what is safe can often lead to never beginning the search.
The truth can be described as, to say of what is, that it is; and to say of what is not, that it is not is to speak the truth. So that's the first step. Looking for what is true by seeing if it is what it claims to be. When a claim is made whether about atheism, pantheism, paganism, monotheistic faiths and Christian denominations, the question "Is it true?" must be asked concerning the claims by the group and the claims made about the group (remember, people often speak falsely about what they don't know).
A search may take a long time. God calls a person on His time, not at your convenience. (And yes, I absolutely believe God exists and loves you personally regardless of whether or not you know Him yet). But the fact that a person has not yet encountered God doesn't give him or her the right to quit searching and just say, "Close enough, I'll just settle for this."
Just remember that it is never right to say "It doesn't matter which one I pick or even if I pick none of them." If you honestly seek the truth and pray to God to lead you to Him, you will eventually meet Him.
Two Attitudes. Two Questions. Two Considerations
Two Attitudes
I have noticed two common attitudes towards religion who try to avoid thinking about it.
The first is the attitude of indifferentism. Indifferentism is basically the attitude that all religions are pretty similar and the differences between them are minor quibbles that don't matter as long as we are all "nice" to each other. (Never mind the fact that what qualifies as being "nice" differs from religion to religion).
The second is the attitude of skepticism. Skepticism also looks at all the religions and sees the differences. The attitude of the skeptic is to look at all the differences and say, "we can't know which one, if any, is true so it doesn't matter if we just opt out of choosing."
These two attitudes—two sides of the same coin—make a universal conclusion out of the differences. Either they are insignificant or insurmountable and therefore religion doesn't matter. Accept or reject religion as you like.
Two Questions
I think these two attitudes can be addressed by two questions. For the Indifferent, the question is:
How do you know they're all equally valid?
For the skeptic, the question is:
How do you know they're all equally unimportant?
Two Considerations
The fact that there are different religions and that they say different things is not a matter of indifference. If there is a right way and a wrong way to do things, then one cannot reasonably say that it doesn't matter what way is chosen. Indifference is a positive laxness that does not think that the differences mean anything. Therefore one is as good as another. But just because the indifferent person sees the differences as unimportant doesn't mean that the differences are unimportant. In the world of law, thinking differences are unimportant and ignoring them can get a person in trouble if the person enforcing the law discovers you chose the wrong understanding of what is right.
This also applies to following God—if God has made known how He wants His followers to follow Him, choosing any old way to act is acting wrongly. Consider the rebellion of Korah in Numbers 16, or the rebelling of Aaron and Miriam (Numbers 12). This was not a matter of indifference to God.
Dr. Peter Kreeft has used this example. Imagine a mountain with many roads going upwards. How do you know they all reach the top? The wrong path will not get you to the desired destination. So if one path is the path God has made (John 14:6) and the others are manmade, then the indifferent attitude that holds that one path is as good as another is a dangerous one indeed.
The skeptic takes an attitude of negative laxness. It too looks at the differences in the claims but, unlike the indifferent, the skeptic sees the contradictions and concludes that we can't know if any of them are true so we can safely ignore all of them. But when you think about it, does that attitude really make sense?
If you should go to a foreign country and are not sure what the traffic laws are, it would be foolish to head out on the road while thinking it doesn't matter if you choose to follow none of them. You would soon be before a judge. You couldn't plead "I didn't know so I thought it wasn't important!" The judge would ask why you didn't bother to at least try to seek out the rules.
Conclusion
Now you may ask me, "with all the competing views, how can I begin to find the right path?" (Now if you ask me personally, I'll try to save you some time and say, "It's the Catholic Church." But since I presume you meant, "How do I search for the right path…?" read on). The answer is, you need to seek out what is true—which means discerning what is true as opposed to what pleases you or what you want to be true.
A lot of people stop at "What gives me pleasure" and never asks whether what feels good is actually good. People get caught up in destructive relationships, alcohol, drugs, etc. They can't see beyond the pleasure and thus can't see that they are not searching for what is truth. Self delusion and fear of losing what is safe can often lead to never beginning the search.
The truth can be described as, to say of what is, that it is; and to say of what is not, that it is not is to speak the truth. So that's the first step. Looking for what is true by seeing if it is what it claims to be. When a claim is made whether about atheism, pantheism, paganism, monotheistic faiths and Christian denominations, the question "Is it true?" must be asked concerning the claims by the group and the claims made about the group (remember, people often speak falsely about what they don't know).
A search may take a long time. God calls a person on His time, not at your convenience. (And yes, I absolutely believe God exists and loves you personally regardless of whether or not you know Him yet). But the fact that a person has not yet encountered God doesn't give him or her the right to quit searching and just say, "Close enough, I'll just settle for this."
Just remember that it is never right to say "It doesn't matter which one I pick or even if I pick none of them." If you honestly seek the truth and pray to God to lead you to Him, you will eventually meet Him.
Saturday, April 20, 2013
We Used To Call This Indoctrination…
When an opponent declares, "I will not come over to your side," I calmly say, "Your child belongs to us already... What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.
—Adolph Hitler. November 6, 1933
Introduction
My sister-in-law told me about an event called "Day of Silence" put on my a group called GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network). While this information came too late for me to write about this as a warning before it happened, I can at least comment on this so people of good will can be aware of what can only be described as propaganda aimed at indoctrinating the youth.
The claimed purpose of this event is to protest against bullying in the public schools. However, when one looks at the materials, what we see is a concerted effort to undermine the moral teaching authority of parents and their religious faiths through misrepresentation and bad logic. It is intended to push a radical agenda which portrays "alternate sexual preferences" as merely a matter of taste and not morality. Because this activity happens in schools, it aims its agenda at people who are considered vulnerable with no chance defending the family religious beliefs until after the fact.
The designed exercises seem aimed to presenting their views as true while pressuring youth who know what is right to cave in or keep silent.
My sister-in-law tells me she kept her son home from school on the day of the event (4/19/13). After reading the material, I can only conclude she is a very wise woman. While I only found out about this event after the fact, I still think it is good to write about this so that people may be aware of this in the future and consider how they might protect their children from overt indoctrination.
Because there is so much to consider, I will focus mainly on one area of attack which happens to be my area of expertise.
Undermining Religious Beliefs of a Family
One example of their tactics in indoctrination is to ask whether Jesus condemned homosexuality in the Bible. They answer that Jesus did not condemn homosexuality. They point out that these condemnations show up in Paul and in the Old Testament. The intended conclusion they want to draw is that if Jesus was opposed to homosexuality, He would have condemned it by name.
The problem is, by this logic, Jesus never condemned bestiality, necrophilia, pedophilia or the like. He never condemned incest either. Come to think of it, He never mentioned consent either, so rape is theoretically OK by this argument.
So are we to assume that Jesus was an "anything goes" type of person? If we accept this kind of argument, we have to assume Jesus was in favor of all sorts of sexual behavior – behavior that promoters of homosexuality get extremely angry over when we point this out.
Actually the "Jesus never said anything about [X]… therefore [X] is ok" argument is a logical fallacy called "argument from silence." The reason this fallacy makes the argument invalid is because silence neither proves support or hostility. However, we can find out what Jesus thought about marriage from other things He said. For example, Matthew 19 tells us:
He said in reply, “Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” (Matthew 19: 4-6)
So what we see is that while Jesus never explicitly condemned homosexuality by name, he explicitly declares that God's intention (from the beginning [see Matt 19:8]) is for man and woman to be married in a lifelong relationship.
What this shows is we have people who are willing to misrepresent what Jesus taught in order to undermine the family beliefs and convictions.
Conclusion
So here's why you should be alarmed, whether you have children in school or not. People who are willing to misrepresent what a person says in order to make a point are behaving dishonestly. Even if one disagrees with Christian teaching on sexual morality, a person of good will should want to condemn a deliberate misrepresentation made in order to deceive someone (called sophistry).
If a group claims to want tolerance and dialogue, they should be open to seeking out the best possible representation of both sides to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the arguments. But if they misrepresent, if they use false arguments, if they intimidate in order to get young people to support their position then we do not have tolerance and dialogue.
Instead we have indoctrination and propaganda.
People of good will should be aware of the fact that this sort of event engages in unscrupulous tactics to push an agenda that parents have every right to oppose. Parents who oppose such events should be supported, and schools who try to allow such events should be opposed.
We Used To Call This Indoctrination…
When an opponent declares, "I will not come over to your side," I calmly say, "Your child belongs to us already... What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.
—Adolph Hitler. November 6, 1933
Introduction
My sister-in-law told me about an event called "Day of Silence" put on my a group called GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network). While this information came too late for me to write about this as a warning before it happened, I can at least comment on this so people of good will can be aware of what can only be described as propaganda aimed at indoctrinating the youth.
The claimed purpose of this event is to protest against bullying in the public schools. However, when one looks at the materials, what we see is a concerted effort to undermine the moral teaching authority of parents and their religious faiths through misrepresentation and bad logic. It is intended to push a radical agenda which portrays "alternate sexual preferences" as merely a matter of taste and not morality. Because this activity happens in schools, it aims its agenda at people who are considered vulnerable with no chance defending the family religious beliefs until after the fact.
The designed exercises seem aimed to presenting their views as true while pressuring youth who know what is right to cave in or keep silent.
My sister-in-law tells me she kept her son home from school on the day of the event (4/19/13). After reading the material, I can only conclude she is a very wise woman. While I only found out about this event after the fact, I still think it is good to write about this so that people may be aware of this in the future and consider how they might protect their children from overt indoctrination.
Because there is so much to consider, I will focus mainly on one area of attack which happens to be my area of expertise.
Undermining Religious Beliefs of a Family
One example of their tactics in indoctrination is to ask whether Jesus condemned homosexuality in the Bible. They answer that Jesus did not condemn homosexuality. They point out that these condemnations show up in Paul and in the Old Testament. The intended conclusion they want to draw is that if Jesus was opposed to homosexuality, He would have condemned it by name.
The problem is, by this logic, Jesus never condemned bestiality, necrophilia, pedophilia or the like. He never condemned incest either. Come to think of it, He never mentioned consent either, so rape is theoretically OK by this argument.
So are we to assume that Jesus was an "anything goes" type of person? If we accept this kind of argument, we have to assume Jesus was in favor of all sorts of sexual behavior – behavior that promoters of homosexuality get extremely angry over when we point this out.
Actually the "Jesus never said anything about [X]… therefore [X] is ok" argument is a logical fallacy called "argument from silence." The reason this fallacy makes the argument invalid is because silence neither proves support or hostility. However, we can find out what Jesus thought about marriage from other things He said. For example, Matthew 19 tells us:
He said in reply, “Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.” (Matthew 19: 4-6)
So what we see is that while Jesus never explicitly condemned homosexuality by name, he explicitly declares that God's intention (from the beginning [see Matt 19:8]) is for man and woman to be married in a lifelong relationship.
What this shows is we have people who are willing to misrepresent what Jesus taught in order to undermine the family beliefs and convictions.
Conclusion
So here's why you should be alarmed, whether you have children in school or not. People who are willing to misrepresent what a person says in order to make a point are behaving dishonestly. Even if one disagrees with Christian teaching on sexual morality, a person of good will should want to condemn a deliberate misrepresentation made in order to deceive someone (called sophistry).
If a group claims to want tolerance and dialogue, they should be open to seeking out the best possible representation of both sides to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the arguments. But if they misrepresent, if they use false arguments, if they intimidate in order to get young people to support their position then we do not have tolerance and dialogue.
Instead we have indoctrination and propaganda.
People of good will should be aware of the fact that this sort of event engages in unscrupulous tactics to push an agenda that parents have every right to oppose. Parents who oppose such events should be supported, and schools who try to allow such events should be opposed.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
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