Contradiction and Hypocrisy

Remember the old and oft refuted argument of “If you’re against X, don’t do X” that was so often invoked to attack opposition to things like abortion and same sex marriage? (For example, “If you’re against abortion, don’t have one!”)

It was easily refuted by plugging in things that most people recognize as wrong:

• If you’re against slavery, don’t own a slave!
• If you’re against rape, don’t rape anyone!
• If you’re against murder, don’t murder anyone!

The fatal flaw in the argument is that some things can never be done, so to argue that a person who opposes something as wrong, simply shouldn’t do it while everybody else does is to make a mockery against any person who ever stood up against evil in a society (“If Martin Luther King Jr. was against racial discrimination, he shouldn’t discriminate against a person of another race!”)

But now, in addition, we’re seeing that people who make these arguments of “just don’t do it" conveniently ignore them when someone tries to apply it against them:

"If you’re against participating in a same sex ‘wedding' then just don’t… Oh, wait—you have to do that anyway, you bigot!"

Once again, those who try to work against religious freedom contradict themselves:

1. If the “If you’re against X, don’t do X” argument is true, then you can’t force Christians who oppose same sex “marriage” to participate in it because, hey, they’re just doing what you said!
2. But if the “If you’re against X, don’t do X” argument is false, then you have to recognize that people have the right to morally object to something they believe is wrong.

Christianity recognizes that the “If you’re against X, don’t do X” is flawed, so it does not contradict itself nor practice hypocrisy in making a stand against things it calls “evil.” However, the person who preaches “tolerance” have caught themselves in a dilemma—if they apply their own argument universally, they can’t coerce Christian business owners to do what they believe is morally wrong. But if they recognize the argument forces them to accept something that they think is morally wrong, then they have to start asking what determines moral right and wrong, and follow that search to the end.

The Christian can and does stand up for what is right, whether or not society approves. There are no moral contradictions in their stand. But there are huge contradictions in the whole approach opponents of religious freedom are taking, and these contradictions are arbitrary infringements aimed at forcing people who disagree with them to comply against what they think is morally right.

God, Sin, Mercy, and Justice

Jesus has some interesting things to say about His relationship with the world and what it means to follow Him:

¹⁷ *“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. ¹⁸ Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place. ¹⁹ Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments will be called greatest in the kingdom of heaven.* ²⁰ I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:17-20)

 

²¹ “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven,* but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. ²² Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name? Did we not drive out demons in your name? Did we not do mighty deeds in your name?’ ²³ Then I will declare to them solemnly, ‘I never knew you.* Depart from me, you evildoers.’ (Matthew 7:21-23)

 

¹⁴ After John had been arrested, Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God: ¹⁵ “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.” (Mark 1:14-15)

 

⁷ The world cannot hate you, but it hates me, because I testify to it that its works are evil. (John 7:7)

 

¹¹ She replied, “No one, sir.” Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, [and] from now on do not sin any more.” (John 8:11)

 

⁴⁰ Some of the Pharisees who were with him heard this and said to him, “Surely we are not also blind, are we?” ⁴¹ Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but now you are saying, ‘We see,’ so your sin remains. (John 9:40-41)

 

¹⁵ “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. (John 14:15)

 

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. ¹⁹ If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember the word I spoke to you, ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. ²¹ And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. ²² If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin; but as it is they have no excuse for their sin. (John 15:18-22)

 

²¹ [Jesus] said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²² And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the holy Spirit. ²³ Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” (John 20:21-23)

These passages are interesting because they testify to the fact that Jesus came to save people from their sins, calling them to turn away from the evil they did. Jesus, out of love for us died so that we might be saved. But the fact that Jesus came to save us from our sins demonstrates that we have sins we need to be saved from, and love of Him requires us to act in a way that is in keeping with how God has called us to live. The Greek word μετανοια (metanoia) means having a change of mind and heart, and metanoia is what Jesus is calling every one of us to have—to turn away from sin and to turn back to God. He also chose His Church built on Peter and the Apostles to go forth with the mission of preaching the Gospel and forgiving sins, saying that rejection of the Church was rejection of Him (Luke 10:16).

The problem is many people who are enthusiastic about Jesus’ message of love and not judging completely overlook the entire message of metanoia. Instead, they prefer a form of Christianity that H. Richard Niebuhr warned about: “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a Kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a Cross."

Under such a view, saying that certain behaviors can damn a person to hell is seen as an insult, not a warning. The worldly Christian thinks that their own actions are not anything to worry about. Others may do bad things (such as Nazis and murderers), but it is believed that God doesn’t care about the things the Church calls sin.

That’s a curious idea. If we believe that Jesus is God, and the Father is God (John 10:30), then we cannot separate God’s commands from Jesus’ saying that we must keep His commandments. But that is exactly what people are trying to argue. They try to argue that because Jesus did not specifically mention a moral issue by name (homosexual acts are frequently mentioned) that Jesus did not condemn them. Of course, you can show how ridiculous that argument is by pointing out that Jesus said nothing about rape, incest, bestiality or necrophilia—does anybody really think Jesus thought those acts were morally acceptable? (Logically, this argument is an argument from silence fallacy).

In fact, Jesus spoke about marriage specifically as an institution between one man and one woman in a lifelong union—things which people are trying to claim the Church must change. When you think about it, it appears that people attacking the teaching of the Church are not being zealous to defend the teachings of Jesus—they are being zealous only to deny that they need to change their behavior.

So, it’s not the Church that people have problems with, but the teachings of God. But people find it easier to blame the Church for promoting the teachings of Jesus while explaining away or denying that Jesus taught any such thing. That way they can pretend to be obedient when their actual behavior is rebellion. The Church is called “legalistic” and contrary to love when she insists on saying that God’s commands are binding. But since Jesus did link loving Him with keeping His commandments, we have a huge contradiction between Jesus as He was and the counterfeit version that people insist the Church is ignoring.

It is true that Jesus came to save the world, not to condemn it (John 3:17), but that is often taken out of context when people assume it means Jesus won’t punish anyone for refusing to change their ways. But when read in content, God’s action is actually conditional on responding to His call:

¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn* the world, but that the world might be saved through him. ¹⁸ Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. ¹⁹ And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. ²⁰ For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light, so that his works might not be exposed. ²¹ But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God. (John 3:17-21)

We can see that believing in God means turning to the light and that means turning away from sin and towards truth. But those who do wicked things hate the light and prefer darkness to light. God is merciful, but His mercy is not “cheap grace.” He gives us the grace and the means to be reconciled to Himself. But He does not force one to receive it against His will and it is possible to refuse the gifts of grace and mercy—whether by outright refusal to believe in Him or by refusal to keep His commandments. If we spurn His mercy, what is left but His justice?

I suspect many people don’t give sufficient thought to these things and what the lack of judgment would mean:

Imagine it is the end of the world. God has brought all before Him to face judgment. There in the back we see a group of people scowling. It’s the infamous dictators and mass murderers who have inflicted suffering on the world. Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, the Kims of North Korea, the Roman Emperors who persecuted Christians (like Nero, Domitian, Diocletian etc.). They’re unrepentant of their sins and proud of what they did.

Now imagine that Our Lord turns to this group and says, “Because I love everyone, I won’t send anyone to hell. So welcome to Heaven.” How do you think the victims of these dictators would feel? For example, the Christians who died rather than renounce their faith—would they not be justified in wondering why they bothered in knowing, loving and serving Jesus when it clearly did not matter whether they did or not? In fact, such people could not say Our Lord was loving because in letting everyone into Heaven, regardless of what they did and whether they repented—even at the moment of their death—would that not make God into somebody who was indifferent to the wrongs done in the world?

It would make God unjust. When we think about it, we don’t want a God who is unjust and does not hold the unrepentant wicked accountable for their sins. Rather we just want a God who doesn’t hold us responsible for the sins we refuse to repent. But when we think about it, such thinking makes us into monstrous hypocrites. We demand mercy without justice for ourselves, but justice without mercy for those we dislike.

Ultimately, we need to recognize that God approaches each of us calling us to turn back to Him and accept His mercy. This turning back means rejecting our sins and keeping His commandments out of love for Him. We should be grieved by our sins and want to turn back to Him just as a man who loves his wife should be sorry for causing her pain and want to reconcile with her. God’s call of mercy is available as long as we live. But if we die unrepentant, we have to face His justice without the mercy that we refused. In such a case, we cannot blame God for being unfair. We have only ourselves to blame.

None of us know how much time we have on Earth. You might live another 50 years. You might die tomorrow. So, we need to accept the grace God offers when we become aware of it, and not treat it as something to do “down the road.” We need to listen to those God has tasked in teaching us right and wrong, and not reject their teaching as hateful or partisan.

Because if we reject them, we reject Christ. And if we reject Christ, we reject God.

April Fools!

I really don’t see the point of doing an April Fools post.

I mean when you have Catholics who think that defying the Pope is being faithful to the Church and radicals who think that defense of religious freedom is intolerance, pretty much anything I could make up as a prank would not sound as strange as what is actually happening today.

Logical Fallacies in the Anti-Religious Freedom Movement

Introduction

There are a number of businesses, organizations and celebrities that are either threatening, carrying out or calling for boycotts of Indiana on account of the passage of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. They call it names like the “Freedom To Discriminate” act (George Takei) and call such laws “dangerous” (Tim Cook). But, as I read the anger spilling out over the internet, I see that the opposition is not based on any fact but rather on logical fallacies

• the begging the question fallacy
• the slippery slope fallacy
• the appeal to emotion fallacy
• the ad hominem fallacy
• the poisoning the well fallacy

The end result of these fallacies is the fact that there is an allegation of intolerance made against the Christian moral teachings, but no proof to justify the claim. Without proof, one cannot say that the accusation is proven true.

Let’s look at them.

The Begging the Question Fallacy

The begging the question fallacy is committed by acting as if something that has to be proven to be true is true. So, if the point of my argument is that “X is bad,” the premises of my argument have to be aimed at proving X is bad. If the premises of my argument are based on the assumption that “X is bad” then I am begging the question. This is commonly done in the assumption that opposition to “same sex marriage” is based on intolerance? Why are they intolerant? Because they oppose “same sex marriage”! That doesn’t answer the question “How do we know it is intolerant?” It merely repeats the (unproven) allegation.

These arguments don’t actually demonstrate that intolerance is the only possible motive for this opposition. It is simply assumed that the no good person would oppose it. So, as a result we say these arguments are unproven—you can’t prove the conclusion by this argument. If we think of an argument as a trial, then we could think of this argument as a prosecutor who alleged the accused was guilty but provided no proof of guilt for it. Any jury deciding the accused was guilty would be causing a miscarriage of justice.

The Slippery Slope Fallacy

The slippery slope fallacy seems similar to showing cause and effect (showing a link between A and B), but in actuality it argues against something simply under the fear of what it might do. In other words, “If we let A happen, B is going to happen,” again assuming but not proving. In this case, the popular example is to portray this law as the modern equivalent of the old “Whites Only” signs in the Segregated South. People ask “What about a restaurant owner refusing to serve a same sex couple?” and go on from there giving all sorts of horror stories of what could happen. Could being the operative word—what might happen does not equal “will happen,” and “what will happen” is what has to be determined before we can condemn something.

To continue the analogy of argument of a trial, this argument is like a prosecutor who tries to argue that "if we don’t convict the defendant, he will go on to commit all sorts of monstrous crimes.” But we don’t convict a person on what they might do, but on what they did do. You don’t know that a person will do this, and it is possible to take just precautions to ensure a crime does not happen without violating civil rights.

The Appeal to Emotion Fallacy

The appeal to emotion fallacy works on the premise that a good emotion associated with a claim leads one to think of it as true, while a negative emotion associated with a claim leads one the claim as false. So to appeal to “the need to let two people in love marry regardless of their gender” awakens a positive idea that same sex “marriage” is good because “love” is good, while awakening hostility towards those who oppose it as being “cold hearted.” But emotion can be exploited. Leaders exploit emotions in propaganda to move people to support their country and oppose another country. The emotions don’t mean that the claims are true.

Using the analogy of a trial once more, the appeal to emotion is like a lawyer not talking about whether the charges are true or not, but instead tries to play on your feelings to give a verdict that he wants.

The Ad Hominem Fallacy

The ad hominem does not seek to prove or disprove anything. Instead, it tries to attack the person making an argument and convince a person that because he or she has negative traits (true or not), we can ignore anything said by that person. An example of this fallacy would be if I said, "Tim Cook could not be trusted to give an accurate account of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act because he was a liberal and a homosexual." Those claims have no bearing on whether or not what he says is true. (A person being a liberal or having a same sex attraction have nothing to do with whether or not a person is speaking the truth).

Likewise, the accusations that the Church is intolerant, homophobic, bureaucratic and heartless (and we deny all of them) have nothing to do with whether the Church teaching on homosexuality is true or not. These are just terms of abuse used to give a negative impression on the listener and turn them away from listening to the argument and considering if it was true.

The Poisoning the Well Fallacy

The poisoning the well fallacy seeks to make a smear attack on the target so that no matter what the targeted person says, the smear remains in the mind of the listener. This is another way where opponents of the Religious Freedom laws attack to prevent people from considering the argument. The attacker alleges that the supporter of this law is bigoted and has a hatred for people with same sex attraction. The result of poisoning the well is that the listener assumes that a defense of the law is simply defending bigotry and hatred.

The Overall Effect

The overall effect of these tactics is to give the listener the impression that the Christian that refuses to participate in a “same sex wedding” does so out of bigotry. Since bigotry is bad, a good person is led to believe that the right thing to do is to oppose Christian belief. 

The Catholic Teaching is NOT What It is Misrepresented to Be

But the problem is not a single one of these accusations are true. The Christian teaching is not motivated by hatred—indeed the Catholic Church condemns hatred. 

When one looks at the definition of hate in a dictionary it tells us the meaning is intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury, ill-will, an extreme dislike or antipathy. But that doesn’t answer the question of whether the Church teaching is motivated by hatred.So we ask: Does the Church have intense hostility and antipathy for the woman who had an abortion or the person with same sex attraction, wishing them harm? That is what has to be proven. It has to actually be established that they despise such a person and wants them to come to harm—like perhaps hoping they go to hell?

So, we would need to look at what the Church taught about the sinner and see if there is such a desire in their treatment of sinners.

But the opposite is true: the Catechism of the Catholic Church makes a distinction between our treatment of persons and treatment of behaviors, saying:

1933 This same duty extends to those who think or act differently from us. The teaching of Christ goes so far as to require the forgiveness of offenses. He extends the commandment of love, which is that of the New Law, to all enemies. Liberation in the spirit of the Gospel is incompatible with hatred of one’s enemy as a person, but not with hatred of the evil that he does as an enemy. (2303)

 

2303 Deliberate hatred is contrary to charity. Hatred of the neighbor is a sin when one deliberately wishes him evil. Hatred of the neighbor is a grave sin when one deliberately desires him grave harm. “But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.” (2094; 1933)

Some people (often derisively) refer to this as “love the sinner, hate the sin.” But while that is true, it is inadequate.

The person who hates a sinner wishes a defiant sinner harm or other misfortune. Such a person is doing what the Church says is wrong. But the person who says “this act is sinful and must be stopped” is not acting out of hatred any more than a doctor who says “Smoking is harmful and must be stopped.” He or she is expressing this information in the hopes that the individual committing it will stop doing it—for their own good.

So, like it or not, the Church is explicitly saying that hatred of a sinner is forbidden and even a grave sin. For the non-Catholic, a grave sin involves serious matter where a person who commits it with full knowledge of its gravity and with full consent to do it anyway would be committing a mortal sin—which is a sin that would damn one to hell if unrepented.

So, in other words, if we hate the woman who has an abortion or the man with same sex attraction, we can go to hell for wishing such a person grave harm. Does that really make any sense to accuse the Church for holding their teaching out of hatred when they say it is evil to hold hatred for a person? Talk about self defeating! The Church does not hate people. However she does have hostility to the actions that are chosen that turn humanity away from God. 

Individuals Who Disobey the Church Exist, But the Church Can’t Be Blamed For Their Actions

Now of course, you can find extremists who actually do hate people instead of the sin committed—people who actually wish evil to afflict sinners. Up until their leader died, the media loved to provide us with stories of the Westboro Baptist Church as an example of Christianity hating people with same sex attraction. It was effective as one could find people pointing to their antics and accusing the Catholic Church of committing them. But in actuality, the Catholic Church teaching is in complete opposition to their antics. As the Catechism says:

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.

Treatment with respect, compassion and sensitivity is incompatible with hatred, so again we have shown that, contrary to accusations, Catholic teaching is not rooted in hatred.

Modern Society Falsely Thinks that Saying Actions Are Wrong Means Hatred of the Person Doing Them

The problem is the modern society takes a love me, love my dog attitude to the extreme. It’s not just a case of demanding that we accept a person with flaws and all—rather it is a demand that we accept those flaws as a good and deny there is anything wrong with them. A refusal to accept those flaws as good is turned into an accusation of hating the person. But, as we have shown above, hatred of a self-destructive behavior (which all sin is) does not mean hating the person suffering from it. It can mean hating a problem which keeps the person from being what they should be.

But once a person demands we accept their sin as if it were good, they see the attempt to help a person as if it were an attempt to harm them. It’s as if a person carrying a heavy load fell into quicksand and the load was dragging them down. We throw them a rope, but the weight of the load prevents them from climbing out to safety and actually threatens to break the rope. We tell them they need to let go of their load and grab the rope, but they refuse, saying that we need to get them out with their load as well. When we tell them it is impossible, they get angry at us and accuse us of wanting them to die. It is untrue. The fact is, in a life or death situation, no possession is worth your life. 

Likewise, in the reality of our having an eternal soul which can be dragged down to hell if we refuse to cooperate with salvation, no vice, no compulsion is worth losing our soul over and no human declaration can make good what God has called evil. Therefore when it comes to the choice of man declaring a thing “good” and God calling that thing “evil,” what we have is a choice between accepting and rejecting God.

Conclusion

The fact is, we deny that Christian moral teaching is based on hatred of people with same sex attraction. It is more like a wife who loves her husband with alcoholism. That alcoholism is destroying his life and his relationship with her. The wife hates this alcoholism because she can see what it is doing to her husband and wants it to be cured so he will stop harming himself and have a better life. The hatred of the harmful act is not done out of hatred for the person.

In such a case, we would recognize the husband’s accusation that his wife hated him because she hated his alcoholism to be wrong. Being an alcoholic is not a part of the man’s nature. It is a flaw which must be overcome, whether by being cured or by avoiding behavior that feeds it.

Now the person may think that their inclination is good. They may cling to it like a heavy load. But the harmful inclination can never be enabled. That is why the Church will never change her teaching on same sex “marriage” or abortion or contraception. We know they are wrong, and we cannot take part in what we know is wrong, even if someone thinks it is morally acceptable.

I think I will close this article with a quote from the novel A Canticle for Leibowitz that I have cited before. 

In it we have a situation where there has been a nuclear war, and people are suffering from radiation sickness.  The government wants to establish facilities to decide who has received enough radiation to be fatal to recommend euthanizing.  The abbot of the monastery where they want to establish the facility tells them he will refuse cooperation unless the doctor promises not to advise people to euthanize themselves.  The doctor says it is not right to do this with non-Catholic patients and accuses the abbot of imposing his views on others and the abbot has no right to make this condition, and demands the abbot explain why he insists on this stance for non-Catholics as well as Catholics.  The abbot responds:

Because if a man is ignorant of the fact something is wrong and acts in ignorance, he incurs no guilt, provided natural reason was not enough to show him that it was wrong.  But while ignorance may excuse the man, it does not excuse the act, which is wrong in itself.  If I permitted the act simply because the man is ignorant that it is wrong, then I would incur guilt, because I do know it to be wrong.  It is really that painfully simple. (A Canticle for Leibowitz. page 296 in my EOS edition)

The doctor responds by accuse the abbot of being merciless and out of touch, which is no refutation of the facts stated by the abbot. Likewise, the accusation that we are bigoted and out of touch is no refutation of our argument.

TFTD: Self-Contradiction by Opponents to Christianity

So, the backlash against Indiana’s Religious Freedom law continues to grow, and one wonders whether things will spill over into violence soon against Christians. The media, with backing from some politicians and some businesses are treating the entire affair as being intended to allow free discrimination against people with same sex attraction—never mind that they are merely making a circular argument that assumes discrimination instead of proving it intends discrimination.

But as I read the news articles and the comments, I am seeing what is amounting to several huge self-contradictions that, when explored, makes these protestors out to be huge hypocrites. Here’s the problem.

1. If nobody should be allowed to force their views on others, then nobody should be allowed to force their views of same sex “marriage” on Christian business owners.
2. If it is acceptable for the law to make demands based on moral beliefs (by banning “anti-gay” discrimination), then it is acceptable for Christians to make law based on the demands of their moral belief.

See the problem here? If relativists try to define the issue the first way (“forcing views on others”) then they are obligated to avoid forcing their views on others, and they cannot try to compel Christian business owners to cooperate with their view that “same sex marriage” is morally acceptable. But if they try the other tactic and claim that they have the right to pass laws that say Christians must cooperate with their beliefs of right and wrong, then logically Christians have the right to pass laws based on their own beliefs of right and wrong.

No matter which universal they stake claim to, Christians can point out they are being hypocritical in their enforcement of it because it is being applied in such a way as to exclude those the protestors disagree with (the Christians), whereas, if opponents of Christianity applied those principles across the board, they could not condemn Christians for behaving as they do without condemning themselves as well.

However, Christians can’t be accused of approaching these two concepts with the same self-contradiction simply because we don’t hold them in the first place. The Christian view is not based on the idea of freedom to behave as one wants, but the freedom to behave as one ought. Anything that blocks a person from doing what is right or forces them to do what is wrong is a violation of that freedom. Because the concept of family as husband, wife and children passing on the values needed for the society to continue from one generation to the next is a building block of the society, the law can be justified in defending it. Things that harm that building block of society by tearing down the things that make it possible to continue society to the next generation need to be prevented and the law is reasonable in using just means to prevent them from destroying it.

So (simplifying greatly), I would say that the Christian moral teaching would hold this principle with no self contradiction:

1. No law should prevent a person from doing what they believe they are morally obliged to do unless that belief causes actual harm to others or the breakdown of the common good (taking another life arbitrarily comes to mind here, as does attacks on the traditional family, committing violence against others without just cause).
2. No law should force a person to do what they believe is morally wrong to do.
3. Laws should promote the common good and protect the family and individuals from those who would actively seek to harm others.

Such a concept on law would not only protect the Christian, but the non-Christian from being forced to do wrong, it would protect society from individuals or groups who claim they have the moral obligation to murder or steal etc. It recognizes that real right and wrong do exist and seeks to make laws that makes it easier to do what is right, and put restrictions on wrongdoing that disrupts society.

No contradiction, no injustice. That’s the difference between the consistent Christian view and the self-contradiction of the inconsistent view of modern Christianophobia that pretends to be in favor of “rights” of all—except Christians.

The Snares of the Devil

Read more »

Our Lord Warned Us and It's Here. Let Us Pray and Prepare

If you look in the comments on news sites and on Facebook concerning the Religious Freedom law in Indiana, it is clear that the reactions seem to stem from a hatred of Christian moral teaching and a willingness to bully anyone who stands up for their faith and refuse to take part in something which their beliefs tell them is wrong. If we would just abandon our beliefs that certain actions are wrong, the world would not hate us.

We shouldn’t be surprised. Our Lord warned us that the world hated Him and it would hate us too for being faithful to Him:

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. ¹⁹ If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember the word I spoke to you,* ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. ²¹ And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. ²² If I had not come and spoken* to them, they would have no sin; but as it is they have no excuse for their sin. ²³ Whoever hates me also hates my Father. ²⁴ If I had not done works among them that no one else ever did, they would not have sin; but as it is, they have seen and hated both me and my Father. ²⁵ But in order that the word written in their law might be fulfilled, ‘They hated me without cause.’ (John 15:18-25)

None of us expected it to be here so soon. Hatred and persecution is something people tend to think of as happening in distant lands, the distant past or the distant future. Sometimes the persecution is milder—legal harassment. Sometimes it is harsh, imprisonment and death for the faith. The people doing the persecution always think they are doing a good thing.

In this case, in America, we have a vocal portion of this nation led by the political and media elites who are determined to portray our insistence not to do evil as a hatred of the people who do these acts. We have a choice. We can either remain faithful to God, praying for Him to strengthen us in the face of this hatred or we can abandon those beliefs which the world finds offensive and become harmless Christians who have no impact on the world.

We know that the second option is not an option if we are going to be faithful to God. So we need to pray for the strength to face whatever form persecution takes for us individually. Some of us may only have to endure hostile words. Others of us may have to endure legal harassment or prosecution. Our task is to bring our Catholic faith to the world, even when we are hated for doing so, even when we are hated for saying, “You must not do this thing!” Even when the branches of our government refuse to face their obligation to protect us from our enemies.

So each of us needs to pray, for ourselves and each other. So when the persecution comes to each one of us, we may do God’s will.