"Those of you without sin cast the first stone!" Thus spoke Christ to the men and women gathered to pummel a prostitute to her death for her perceived errors. Today, in America, nothing has changed as the Roman Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ prepares to symbolically stone the men and women of public office for their perceived errors by publicly refusing them Communion. (A fitting betrayal to this the Holy Year of the Eucharist, don't you think? How proud Our Lord must be of his Church.) Yet those who have sworn an oath to the Constitution of the United States and her citizens to represent the laws governing our nation are now promised just such an attack by the current Synod of Bishops at the Vatican in Rome. Our public servants, men and women of principal and conscience, are likely to be denied the Sacraments of their Faith unless they follow the teaching of the Church in their decisions in public office. This is effectively a push from the Church to twist an arm and govern America. The laws of the United States of America and our United States Constitution are clear: no public official shall allow a foreign power to manipulate or to hold power over the elected officials of the United States. What is the apparently urgent critical current battle of the Vatican Foreign State in America and Western Europe? This Institution desires to obliterate all hope of civil recognition for homosexual men and lesbian women, and especially squash the recognition of either same sex domestic partnerships or same sex marriage. As the laws are changing and more countries uphold the basic right of homosexual persons to be held equal to heterosexual persons in civil life and law, the pressure is being increased dramatically to undermine our independent governments' progress. Many European governments have declared that all men are entitled to civil equality under EU laws and that their law does not allow for this discrimination. Canada's Parliament and the Courts and Legislatures of some States in America have ruled that our Constitution must likewise not discriminate. Slowly, but surely, the GLBT community has gained recognition of equality under the law - and it has the Church steamin'!
If the Church wishes to use the Body of Christ, Holy Communion, as a political weapon to attempt to force it's hoped for legislation through Civil Governments world-wide, should it not only use Our Lord as a political weapon to blackmail all those leaders who have sworn to uphold their countries Laws, Constitutions, Parliaments, et-cetera and yet who carelessly do not support ALL the Church's moral and ethical positions; (the care of their aged and ill citizens, abortion, contraception, illegal war, divorce, and so on)? Why do the Pope and his bishops choose to make examples suddenly of those Catholics who have supported Civil Equality for gays? Where is the uniformity of enforcement of all their beliefs? I believe the answer is that it is not found because the deep, visceral hatred felt for homosexuals by these men of the Church eclipses all other sentiment either good or evil within them. It is the same syndrome experienced by some white men of the Southern United States as Black integration into THEIR world became a reality.
Alternatively, at what point does the Church recognize and act upon Christ's words "Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's" and accept and believe that it does apply to them? We, and most of the world, live in Civil Democracies which are secular and we hold the separation of Church and State to be a cornerstone and the bedrock of our Government. The tyranny of a corrupt Church in Europe was one of the horrors to be abolished in America. We have fought a War of Independence in which this right, this freedom to worship or not worship, to choose which faith or none and the guarantee of no interference from or over any church, has a founding place of honor so important that it is enshrined in the very document proclaiming our American Freedoms, our Bill of Rights. It is our cornerstone, and it is emblazoned 1776!
Whatever our individual faith and system of worship demands of us personally it stops at the Church door. It may not undermine our Civil Government with undo influence upon our elected officials. The Church has in most cases the same ability to influence our political system as every other political body does, but not all. Specifically, the Church is denied influencing from the altar the political decisions of our citizens, its parishioners. The Church may not tell you whom to vote either for or against, nor may it influence parishioners specifically about the proposed legislation at referendum. The Church remains tax exempt because of it's promise to not instruct from the altar it's opinions to it's captive audience as some sort of civil dogma. Even Catholics have as Americans the right to freedom of conscience and to formulate their civil vote without the undo pressure of the Church. Further, this threat to condemn our public officials who are Catholic by using Holy Communion as a weapon is archaic and repulsive to any man of genuine Faith and personal integrity. If American churches wish to be involved in our civil political system to this extent then they have the moral obligation to pay for the privilege, as every other institution does, and must relinquish their tax exempt status. These are the rules - and since it's own religious rules are what the Church wishes to impose on America's multi-faith, secular and pluralistic society: force upon Muslims, Hindus, Jews, liberal Christians, Agnostics and Atheists among others, than it should be reminded that its coffers are fair game as well. Until our churches refrain from active politics from the pulpit, giving their political opinion the weight of God's Word, or until they are required to pay taxes for the privilege to so speak out, I recommend the cessation of tithing to your house of worship.
Our system of government is not without flaws, but it is the greatest hope of the common man and for the equality of all men that our world has yet seen. We must protect our system from all those who would undermine it in order to achieve their political goals. The Church has every opportunity to express it's views of ethics and morals without resorting to an attempt to govern our country itself by a code of faith which clearly represents only a segment of our citizens. Teach your faith at Church, not politics. I imagine doing so would actually lead to better voters overall as the end result.
To read about the current Bishop's Synod in Rome click the title of this posting to take you there.
If the Church wishes to use the Body of Christ, Holy Communion, as a political weapon to attempt to force it's hoped for legislation through Civil Governments world-wide, should it not only use Our Lord as a political weapon to blackmail all those leaders who have sworn to uphold their countries Laws, Constitutions, Parliaments, et-cetera and yet who carelessly do not support ALL the Church's moral and ethical positions; (the care of their aged and ill citizens, abortion, contraception, illegal war, divorce, and so on)? Why do the Pope and his bishops choose to make examples suddenly of those Catholics who have supported Civil Equality for gays? Where is the uniformity of enforcement of all their beliefs? I believe the answer is that it is not found because the deep, visceral hatred felt for homosexuals by these men of the Church eclipses all other sentiment either good or evil within them. It is the same syndrome experienced by some white men of the Southern United States as Black integration into THEIR world became a reality.
Alternatively, at what point does the Church recognize and act upon Christ's words "Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's" and accept and believe that it does apply to them? We, and most of the world, live in Civil Democracies which are secular and we hold the separation of Church and State to be a cornerstone and the bedrock of our Government. The tyranny of a corrupt Church in Europe was one of the horrors to be abolished in America. We have fought a War of Independence in which this right, this freedom to worship or not worship, to choose which faith or none and the guarantee of no interference from or over any church, has a founding place of honor so important that it is enshrined in the very document proclaiming our American Freedoms, our Bill of Rights. It is our cornerstone, and it is emblazoned 1776!
Whatever our individual faith and system of worship demands of us personally it stops at the Church door. It may not undermine our Civil Government with undo influence upon our elected officials. The Church has in most cases the same ability to influence our political system as every other political body does, but not all. Specifically, the Church is denied influencing from the altar the political decisions of our citizens, its parishioners. The Church may not tell you whom to vote either for or against, nor may it influence parishioners specifically about the proposed legislation at referendum. The Church remains tax exempt because of it's promise to not instruct from the altar it's opinions to it's captive audience as some sort of civil dogma. Even Catholics have as Americans the right to freedom of conscience and to formulate their civil vote without the undo pressure of the Church. Further, this threat to condemn our public officials who are Catholic by using Holy Communion as a weapon is archaic and repulsive to any man of genuine Faith and personal integrity. If American churches wish to be involved in our civil political system to this extent then they have the moral obligation to pay for the privilege, as every other institution does, and must relinquish their tax exempt status. These are the rules - and since it's own religious rules are what the Church wishes to impose on America's multi-faith, secular and pluralistic society: force upon Muslims, Hindus, Jews, liberal Christians, Agnostics and Atheists among others, than it should be reminded that its coffers are fair game as well. Until our churches refrain from active politics from the pulpit, giving their political opinion the weight of God's Word, or until they are required to pay taxes for the privilege to so speak out, I recommend the cessation of tithing to your house of worship.
Our system of government is not without flaws, but it is the greatest hope of the common man and for the equality of all men that our world has yet seen. We must protect our system from all those who would undermine it in order to achieve their political goals. The Church has every opportunity to express it's views of ethics and morals without resorting to an attempt to govern our country itself by a code of faith which clearly represents only a segment of our citizens. Teach your faith at Church, not politics. I imagine doing so would actually lead to better voters overall as the end result.
To read about the current Bishop's Synod in Rome click the title of this posting to take you there.
No comments:
Post a Comment