From the Family Research Council
Look at the Contrast
Liberal columnists are constantly trying to link conservative Christians with Muslim fundamentalists, suggesting that we are engaged in a jihad against their enlightened ideas. The Rev. Don Wildmon of the American Family Association is denounced as a mullah whenever he leads a protest against some liberal outrage on television . . . They had originally planned to have Britney Spears as a Christian conservative with a cooking show billed as “Cruci-fixin’s.” NBC has now stated that that storyline will not be present in the Spears’ episode.
Notice, though, what Don Wildmon has not done. He hasn’t burned NBC executives’ homes, threatened them with death, or strapped explosives to a bicycle messenger. Look at Europe. There, Muslim protesters against an offensive Danish cartoon portrayal of Mohammed have burned flags, set fire to a Danish Embassy, praised mass murderers, and yelled “Freedom Go To H_ll!” Four people have died in the rioting. We will continue to speak out against the media’s constant attempts to insult and degrade Christians and Christianity. But we will continue to use the means and methods of freedom – freedom that rests upon the foundation of Christianity.
“The fundamental issue is, of course, the compatibility of religion with liberalism. This is a profound one, and liberalism (I mean it in the classical sense) has succeeded, in large part, in taming religious conviction in the West, in privatizing it sufficiently, for democratic pluralism to work. What unreconstructed Islam represents – in its interpenetration with the West – is a delayed response of fundamentalist faith to liberal democracy. True fundamentalism is incompatible with liberal democracy. And that’s why, although at the moment the Christianists* are nowhere near as intolerant or as violent as the Islamists, we have to be vigilant at home as well. I will simply note a recent comment by a fundamentalist about the casting of a gay actor in a Christian movie [The End of the Spear]:
‘[I]t would probably be an overreaction to firebomb these men’s houses. But what they have done is no mistake. It is a calculated strategy.’
Note one word: “probably”. – Time Magazine (Andrew Sullivan)
(Sullivan’s a Catholic and has stood up for Christianity on shows like Bill Maher’s, so he’s hardly anti-religious.)
Christianity is now a different religion than it once was, granted. But didn’t Christians once organize massive record burnings when Lennon said the Beatles were more popular than Jesus? Books that promoted “subversive thought” (like the “Catcher In The Rye”) were once sent up in fiery conflagrations on a relatively frequent basis as well as well as banned. Practitioners of Wicca were once burned to death at one point in our history. Reconstructionists are still calling for the civil punishment of blasphemy in this country, and the boycotts of the AFA are so extensive that one would have to eschew every product currently made in America and become Amish to properly protest. I won’t even bring up the Spanish Inquisition.
This separatism and reactionary behavior is not as common as it once was, but why? What influences were exerted upon Christianity to render it a less fiery and violent faith and one more “tolerant” of diverse ideas, cultures and people in a way that modern Islam, for example, is not? I’m not sure I have an answer but am simply posing the question. It seems that religions rarely reform from within but do so because of ideologies presented from outside. Polygamy wasn’t seen as a problem for the LDS until external influences were brought in, and how much longer would slavery been continued unless slaves actually voiced their indignation over being beaten from sun up until sun down as payment for their grueling labor?
My point is that the classical liberalism and pluralism that is so vehemently hated by many Christians (and some “fundamentalist liberals”) is the same philosophy that has in fact rendered Christianity a more peaceful “movement” within America to where we no longer send up anything (or anyone) that makes us uncomfortable in a heap of smoke.
James, do you have any real grasp of Christian history besides what you have gleaned from popular culture? Are you aware of the contribution of Christianity to the intellectual and moral heritage of the West — indeed, how Christianity is even the foundation of that heritage? Do you understand that the reason for the moral and spiritual vacuum in Europe that renders them so susceptible to Moslem intimidation is because many Europeans have jetissoned their Christian faith, and thus their culture — including the intangible constituents that both shape and are fostered by it like courage, aesthetics, the value of learning, respect for tradition, political freedom, etc?
You need to learn a bit more history. You also need to understand the interrelationship between religion and culture better than you let on here. Start here: Civilization Without Religion.
Here’s another: How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization
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I still stunned that he doesn’t realize that without Protestantism there wouldn’t be any liberal democracy in the west as we know it.
I’m not saying Christianity hasn’t contributed to civilization (the sciences and arts, especially) in a unique and profound way. What I’m suggesting is that democracy as most of us understand it is not compatible with fundamentalism of any sort, whether it be of the secular or Christian variety. As such, these should be resisted, even if it means placing ourselves in opposition to those we’d normally agree with. I may sympathize with those offended by some of Rush Limbaugh’s diatribes, but you will not see me boycotting, protesting or otherwise attempting to shut the guy off. Why? Well, despite his general lack of modesty, he sometimes states some important facts that should be heard. Besides, other people find him entertaining: who am I to deprive them?
The notion that freedom of speech is particularly Christian is one I’m not certain I agree with. Just because a body of Christians devised this concept doesn’t mean it’s intrinsic to the Christian faith. It’s certainly not Scriptural, and churches do not operate like that: doctrine is narrowly defined and dissenting theologians are booted out while the faithful who do not toe the line may be excommunicated (though this is admittedly rare these days). I don’t just see this from conservatives, it comes from liberal denominations as well. Now, many fundamentalists wish to extend this mode of governing into all realms of public life: some local officials have acted to shut down ALL businesses on Sunday in observance of the Sabbath, despite the fact that Jews observe it on Saturday and non-believers don’t observe it at all (I think they’re called “blue laws”). Don’t believe as we do? Too bad. You’re going to just lose money if we’re feeling generous.
The problem with Europe is that they’ve taken “tolerance” as a value to the extreme that they’ve tolerated an influx of people who hope to not assimilate but override and destroy. Obviously, a line has to be drawn somewhere.
JamesK, Karen Armstrong’s Misleading Fundamentalism
I think that the current usage of the term “fundamentalism” is very harmful to clarity of thought. Most modern American commentators use the term “fundamentalist” for anyone who takes the Bible seriously and believes that its contents are true; anyone who hasn’t drained the vitality from their Faith to the point where Church is a pleasant social/political club.
I think that Karen Armstrong has popularized it. I have seen her speak on several occaisions and she has a good word to say for every religious tradition except Christianity. One could say she has an abiding hatred of Christianity. She wrote a book about her experience as a Catholic nun and it is scathing. Oddly she has nothing critical or harsh to say about Islam, quite an unusual stance given Islam’s “colorful” history. Armstrong is widely read and for the life of me I don’t know why. She is a frequent speaker at events sponsored by Islamics and is often trotted out to support their “ecumenical” position. I think she is on a life long revenge quest to be quite honest.
James, we have discussed this before on the board but the idea that a Church has the right to define its theology and therefore define its membership is not contrary to liberty and justice. All Churches in America are VOLUNTARY associations and people may join, leave and form new VOLUNTARY associations at will.
Theology is not developed by a vote of the current members. The idea of a “dissenting Catholic” or a “dissenting anything” is an oxymoron. Those who can not or do not accept the official theology of a Church are under NO compulsion to remain in the Church with those that do accept the official theology.
This is not tyrannical because a Christian body is not political entity.
There is no contradiction between accepting the teachings of a Christian church and accepting that Church’s right to define itself and constitutional democracy. Constitutional democracy is properly conducted by a whole different set of rules. Free debate and free speech is the heart of constitutional democracy and people may change their elected leaders and even their constitution if they can peacefully persuade others of the advantages of that course of action.
The U.S. Constitution and Offensive Language
As I have noted before, there is a well developed body of U.S. Constitutional law which would protect those cartoons if drawn or distributed in America. Our Constitution and our Courts have taken a very firm line that there are only a very few instances in which speech may be regulated. U.S. Courts have limited the doctrine covering “incitement to violence” to situations comparable to a bar fight where the police step in after the fighting words have been spoken and just before the punch is thrown.
There is an important Constitutional doctrine that rejects the “heckler’s veto.” If I go to a public park and stand on a soap box to deliver a speech on my political views, the fact that someone in the audience heckler’s me doesn’t give the government the right to control MY SPEECH and MY CONDUCT. In the United States there is no “heckler’s veto.”
There is also NO such thing as “hate speech.” This is an invention of the academic Left. Something they have used in their UNCONSTITUTIONAL SPEECH CODES on American campuses. These speech codes have been struck down whenever and wherever they have been challenged. See http://www.thefire.org
JamesK, Free Speech Protections Preceding the Virginia or U.S. government
It is my understanding that the first written protection of free speech was codified by the colonial legislature of Virginia, then later adopted in the U.S. Constitution.
JamesK, can you tell me of any clearly defined, and express doctrine or LAW protecting freedom of speech in any country or society, prior to this event? Locating scholars or philosophers who argued in favor of fredom of speech doesn’t count. You need to locate an actual political entity with an express law protecting freedom of speech. Please inform me if you are aware of any such thing. Given that the citizens (subjects) of the American colonies were nearly uniformly Christian (and Jewish) and given that those citizens were far more devoutly and actively Christian than today’s population, why would it be improper to call “free speech” a product of Christian civilization?
Methinks that the current educational fad of dismissing the study of the Greeks, Romans, English common law and American constitutional history is coming home to roost. Today’s students are nearly ignorant of this intellectual tradition and that is the intentional product of an insane academic position which is anti-Western. Having spent many post secondary years in the halls of academia I have mountains of proof of this assertion.
Missourian writes: “I think that the current usage of the term ‘fundamentalism’ is very harmful to clarity of thought. Most modern American commentators use the term ‘fundamentalist’ for anyone who takes the Bible seriously and believes that its contents are true.”
The “sacred book” is one aspect of fundamentalism. Many people other than Karen Armstrong have used the term, although as you note her writings have certainly popularized it.
It is actually quite a useful term, as it identifies a collection of traits that cut across many different religions or sects. Here’s one set of traits:
1) religious idealism as basis for personal and communal identity;
2) fundamentalists understand truth to be revealed and unified;
3) it is intentionally scandalous . . . outsiders cannot understand it;
4) fundamentalists envision themselves as part of a cosmic struggle;
5) they seize on historical moments and reinterpret them in light of this cosmic struggle;
6) they demonize their opposition and are reactionary;
7) fundamentalists are selective in what parts of their tradition and heritage they stress;
8) they are led by males;
9) they envy modernist cultural hegemony and try to overturn the distribution of power.
Definitions of Christian fundamentalism tend to be more text-based, if you will. For example, British scholar James Barr defined Christian fundamentalism as the belief in biblical inerrancy. More modern definition tend to be less test-based and more related to fundamentalism as a reaction to modernity. In that sense I think a number of people here would be considered fundamentalists, or at least as having a family resemblance to fundamentalists.
Jim, You prove my point.
Well, anyone can define a term any way they like. If you are writing an essay and you use the term “fundamentalism” then you should define the term so that your readers know what you are talking about.
As a political matter, the term “fundamentalist” is a perjorative, no body wants to be called a “fundamentalist” because that is the term that is always used to describe extreme, irrational and violent behavior. As a political matter, the term “fundamentalism” is used by many secularists who wish to lump the Christian tradition together with the Islamic tradition and conflate the two very different world views. These two world views have been in conflict for centuries and lump them together is you wish, it won’t change reality. Many secularists distort authentic Christian teaching and paint Christianity as harsh and judgmental, it is part of their justification for their own abandonment of the Faith. If they were really confident that they had made the right decision by abadoning the Faith they wouldn’t have to flog Christianity so much. Old country sayin “Nobody kicks a dead dog.” So, of course, since the “gates of Hell will not prevail against it” I’m not worried.
The definition that you provided is applicable only if you expressly adopt it when you are writing about political or religious affairs. I don’t think that there exists a uniform, agreed upon definition of the term across religious and political fields of study or thought.
Old Saw: Intense Religious Belief Is a Cause of Violence? Atheists Don’t have a Good TRack Record
Secularists frequently argue that religious belief is a cause of violence and they point to the Crusades and conflicts in Europe following the Reformation. Given that the world has now suffered through nearly a century of atheism, the world can compare between the violence of atheistic societies and religious societies.
Communism was an expressly atheistic ideology. It worked to eradicate religious faith of all kinds and announced that Communism was creating a New Man and a New World. There is plenty of proof that Lenin, Stalin and their successors killed more than 50 million people. Many people give Mao the blame for killing as many as 50 million more. We have the Eastern European Gulags, Cambodia’s Pol Pot, and the current North Korean gulags to add to that total. So, we have nearly 100 years of experience with aggressive and militant atheistic regimes and the DEATH TOLL is MASSIVE. Even if strong religious faith generates conflict and violence (a point I do not accede but accept only for the sake of argument) then strong atheistic convictions are just as prone to violence.
Again the charge of violence promotion is an attempt by secularists to tar Christianity and Judaism with the same brush as Islam. It was Christian reformers that led the movement to abolish slavery and it was Islam which resisted that abolition.
Lastly, I have yet to see any Atheist Society Free Hospitals. Atheists don’t build schools, hospitals, colleges and libraries. Even if the charge of violence promotion were true, at least religious people offset that by contributing much to society. Nearly all the Ivy League Colleges were founded as religious institutions. Atheists just don’t contribute much and they kill very many people when they come to power.
Jim Holman’s Fundamentalism Fits Communism to a Tee
Jim you are on to something. Look at the close fit between your definition of fundamentalism and communism.
Point 1: Religious idealism that serves as a basis for personal and communal identity.
Communists demanded complete allegiance to their cause and required a committment to remaking the world according to their ideals. Comrades were expected to renounce religion and to put the Party above even family ties or national allegiances.
Point2: Fundamentalists understand truth to be reveals and unified.
Marx presented what he considered to be a theory of history. According to Marx, history was a phenomenon that could be studied in the same way that physical phenomenon were studied. He claimed to have discovered the scientific principles for studying history. He claimed that his theory supplanted and replaced all previous scholarship,
Point 3: It is intentionally scandalous, outsiders cannot understand it.
Marx and Hegal both practiced German inflected philosophical ruminations. Truth be told very few people have ever really made it through Das Kapital, but, Das Kapital remained the “Bible” of Marxism. If someone couldn’t understand Das Kapital or if they found a logical error, it was attributed to the reader’s lack of intellectual ability.
Point 4: They sieze historical moments and reinterpret them in light of the cosmic struggle.
Marx came up with his own cosmic struggle and he provided an interpretation of the French revolution and the Industrial revolution that he interpreted in light of his paradign of the struggle between the classes and the struggle for the control of the means of production
Point 5: They demonize their opposition and are reactionary.
Lenin and Stalin consistently demonized their opposition, sent them to show trials and killed them. No greater demonization than killing your opponent, all 50 million of them.
As to reactionary policies. For the sake of his own power, Stalin was willing to destroy a prosperous and functioning agricultural economy of the Ukraine by starving the peasants. This brought the Ukraine back to the stone age. Nothing more reactionary than that. Stalin didn’t care about the damage done to Russia by this act, it promoted his power. Pol Pot lead people out of the cities into the country and tried to impose simple peasant life on the entire country. Pol Pot hated modern technology and intellectuals. Mao also lead his people out of the cities and back into primitive peasant life. These reactionary steps were done to more completely reshape and remold human nature. They failed, didn’t they?
Point 6: Fundamentalists are selective in what part of history and tradition they stress.
Marx believe that advanced industrial societies would develop a Communist revolution first, in fact, it was a pre-industrial Russia that first went Communist. This massive miscalculation was consistently ignored by Communists and Marx did not suffer any loss of stature as a result of this mistake. In fact, Lenin had to rework the theory to account for this mistake, hence, his invention of his theory of Imperialism which persists today.
Point 7: They are led by males.
Marx, Hegel, Lenin, Stalin, Kruschev, Mao, Che Guervera, Castro, Pol Pot: all males I believe.
Point 8: They envy modernist cultural hegemony and try to overturn the balance of power.
Russia told its people that America was a failing society and that the poor begged for food in the street.
Russians fought to escape their society. Russia sought to defeat and overturn the success of America.
Any independent observer who was privy to the true facts of Russian and American society knew that America surpassed Russia by nearly every measure yet Russia sought to overturn this situation and to replace America’s success with its failure.
Missourian wrote:
It sounds like the rhetoric on any major U.S. university campus today.
I agree with most of FIRE’s objectives. The speech codes on today’s campuses are absurd. You can’t even say “crazy” out of fear of offending someone who works with the … “mentally ill”, “mentally challenged” .. what’s the PC word, anyhow?
Our Founding Fathers were generic Christians in that they were Deists as well as other denominations. However, it’s faulty reasoning to conclude that because our Founding Fathers were Christians AND they devised freedom of speech as a right worthy of protection via civil law that one must necessarily conclude that freedom of speech is therefore a Christian value. It’s like asserting that if Abraham Lincoln was a vegetarian and a Christian, all Christians are therefore vegetarians. Freedom of speech as a concept was promoted by the ancient Greeks (before Christ). Let’s not forget that the right as we know it today wasn’t even understood by the early colonists as such: they still carried over English laws regarding “libelous sedition”, though they weren’t enforced very often.
As you mentioned, one can still be a committed Catholic or a committed Southern Baptist or Orthodox and still allow society at large to say, do or think things that are unacceptable for a private organization or body of religious. My personal issue is with those who are slowly blurring those lines to the point where the two are no longer distinct. It’s fine if you wish to observe the Sabbath by not working, but when you create “blue laws” to force everyone else not to work as well, there’s a problem. It’s fine if you wish to abstain from all alcohol or gambling, but when you attempt to impose those particular values by changing the laws so that those who disagree with you are punished, there’s a problem. These aren’t just religious vs. secular issues either. I don’t see why Catholics should forego Bingo Night just because some other denominations find even small-time gambling to be a vice.
Again, JamesK, produce the evidence I requested
To the best of my knowledge, the first codified (made into law) protection of Free Speech came into being in Virgiania and then was adopted across America in the Constitution. Virtually every American colonist would have described himself as Christian or Jewish, with very, very few exceptions. Yes, Jefferson was close to a free thinker, but, important as he was, the was NOT the sum total of Colonial society. Most colonies were EXPRESSLY FOUNDED BY CHRISTIAN BELIEVERS for the SAKE OF PRACTICING THEIR FAITH IN PEACE.
Euclid developed the first systematic theory of geometry. He was a Greek and he lived about 400 B.C. This cultural achievement is generall attributed to the Greek culture of the day. Very few Greeks were practicing mathematicians and very few Greeks even were literate. However, no scholar hesitates to credit Greek culture with the Euclid’s work.
It takes a tremendous amount of mental strain to deny the Christian nature of the Colonies which were founded by Christians seeking to attain freedom to worship according to their conscience. The standard anti-Christian argument generally consists of finding a Deist quote from Jefferson and then claiming that this piece of evidence is conclusive of the issue, it is not.
Note 12, Founding Father Not Generic Christians
While it is true that you can find some Deist quotes from Jefferson, it is absolutely false that “our Founding Fathers were generic Christians.” This is totally absurd, revisionist history. Remember, as important as the original drafters of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were, they were not the sum total of America. The Constitution had to be approved by other than the Founders, that is why there was such a tremendous debate about it. The colonists were active and enthusiastic Christians as evidence by Franklin’s decision to join two different Churches when he decided to go into Philadelphia politics. JamesK, you need to do some serious reading. You have been throwing out these false cliches about American history for more than a year now.
George Washington had a deep and sincere Faith as evidenced by his formal writings, his letters and his journals. He was a serious student of the Bible. Washington was able to draw people to him and to lead because of the recognized strength of this character. He was universally respected for his integrity, fortitude, and decency. This is why so many colonists looked to him in difficult times.
Atheism does not forge strong character. Atheism is no shelter or source of strength in times of trial.
Washington’s strength of character can rightly be attributed to his strong and abiding Faith.
Note 13. Here is another book you should read: On Two Wings: Humble Faith and Common Sense at the American Founding. Start by reading the reviews on Amazon.
James, you really have to read more history. The ideas you hold are pop culture stuff.
Colonists Sacrifice and Risk Nearly Everything for Religious Freedom
Leaving the United Kingdom and traveling to the New World was a very risky proposition. The North America offered good land, but, not easy living. Colonists left their titles, lands, and extended families in Britain when they traveled to America. When they waved goodbye on the dock, it was, for all intents and purposes a final good-bye, as none of them knew if they would ever see England again. Imagine leaving the only country you have ever known to travel to a totally wild and uncivilized place. Many colonists didn’t make it through the first winter. Food supplies were often spotty. Diseases could wipe out entire small colonies. Indians were sometimes friendly, sometimes hostile. People seeking easy money and gold went to Central and South America. North America lacked any easily developed gold deposits.
Why would these people do this? Sure, land was attractive, but the risk to life and limb was egregious in the early days. It was devotion to religious belief that drew people across the sea, in many, many cases. Religious belief was definitely NOT generic. Religious belief was a very important topic in Britain, it has been the source of controversy and wars for generations. People in the U.K. had to undergo a religious test to hold office. People were required to publicly support the official religion through their taxes and their government. Religion was far from a private matter and never a casual matter. No one was casual about religion, no one was “generic.”
What an insult to our courageous forebears that anyone would call them “generic” Christians.
Missourian writes: “As a political matter, the term “fundamentalist” is a perjorative, no body wants to be called a ‘fundamentalist’ because that is the term that is always used to describe extreme, irrational and violent behavior.”
Well, some fundamentalists are violent, some arent. Some are nice people, some aren’t.
You are right that people don’t like being called fundamentalist, but I think you miss the reason. The reason they don’t like it is that it humanizes ideas that the fundamentalists believe are divine in origin, and casts them almost as a kind of pathology or at least a syndrome shared by all sorts of people. It is a shock to realize that this whole approach to life and religion that you thought was divine is really a very human approach, shared by all sorts of groups that you thought were very different from your group. (I speak from experience here.)
Missourian writes: “As a political matter, the term ‘fundamentalism’ is used by many secularists who wish to lump the Christian tradition together with the Islamic tradition and conflate the two very different world views.”
The belief particulars are very different as are the resulting actions, and really, the whole worldview. What Christian and Muslim fundamentalism have in common is a similar reaction to modernity.
Missourian: “Many secularists distort authentic Christian teaching and paint Christianity as harsh and judgmental, it is part of their justification for their own abandonment of the Faith.”
Well, it often is harsh and judgmental. If you don’t think it is harsh and judgmental, then you’re hanging out with the wrong (or right) people.
Missourian: “I don’t think that there exists a uniform, agreed upon definition of the term across religious and political fields of study or thought.”
There isn’t a uniform definition, but there is, to borrow a phrase from Wittgenstein, a family resemblance between the different forms of fundamentalism.
Missourian: “Jim you are on to something. Look at the close fit between your definition of fundamentalism and communism.”
Actually, that’s similar to the point that Sam Harris made in his book _The End of Religion_. Harris sees communism not as against religion, but as a competing religion:
“Communism was not an attempt to erase faith. It was a new faith, albeit one that did not look beyond this life. Communism was shot through with irrationality. Stalin’s repudiation of “capitalist biology” in favor of Lysenkoism . . . is but one example of the dogmatism that was the soul of Communism. Freethinking (that is to say rational) scientists were sent to the gulag for failing to support this ideology.”
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/feature/-/542154/104-5485960-1725568
Missourian: “Communism was an expressly atheistic ideology. It worked to eradicate religious faith of all kinds and announced that Communism was creating a New Man and a New World.”
But I think you’ve already argued against your own position. What you say about communism is true; there is a religious aspect to it. (I don’t think I’d call it fundamentalist, but I get your point.) And Sam Harris agrees with you. According to Harris — and you — communism was a competing religion, not an anti-religious ideology. You might say it was against all religions — except itself.
JamesK, Greeks promoted free speech
Why was Socrates killed? No law, no codification, no constitution forming a basis for a government and a country until the United States. Discussions by philosophers are nice, but, they do not have the weight of a committment of an entire society to free speech.
Splitting Hairs
Marx called religion the “opium of the people.” Stalin claimed that the Orthodox Church would die out after the “last grandmother” died. Communism was expressly anti-religious, anti-Christian, anti-Jewish.However, it is also true that Communism sort to SUPPLANT and REPLACE religion and to HOLD THE POSITION held by religion in people’s lives. It made life-changing demands on people, it advanced a faith by a holy book. No I am not the first person to describe Communism as an alternative religion.
I am glad that you see that Communism is a relacement for religion and that it displays the negative charactertistics that you ascribed to a “fundamentalist” ideology.
Similar Reaction to Modernity?
Puhleeze, Jim. The American revolution occured without an assault on religion. It was the French that kicked their clerics out of power. Within the Christian tradition, Americans FORMULATED freedom of thought, the precondition to all “modernity.” all in harmony with religion.
Christianity teacher companiate marriage the very foundation of the equality of the sexes. This was done at atime when polygamy was seen as a male’s option, if he had the wealth.
The Christian teaching that we should give to Ceasar what is Ceasar’s and to God what is God’s is the foundation for the whole idea of the separation of religion and politices. What is more modern than that?
Sorry, Charlie, you can’t reinvent intellectual history and claim that modernity arose from anything but the ancient Greek intellectual tradition and the Christian tradition. There are no non-Chrisitan Modern societies. Asia doesn’t count as it simply apped Chrisitian societies.
Jim, your definition of fundamentalism assumes that all religion is nothing more than an intellecutal construct deviod of any reality beyond the mind of the men who created it. It also assumes that such religion is nothing more than a vain attempt to control people. There are such religions, even among those who call themselves Christian, but the reality of the Christian faith is founded on the Incarnation of the Living God for us and our salvation. One either accepts and knows that Jesus is fully man and fully God at an ontological level or one does not. Mere mental agreement does not save. One either accepts the real transforming power of the Holy Spirit by repentance or one does not.
The Christian faith is really quite tolerant of the sins of people because we know that without God’s forgiveness we are all justly destined to eternal damnation. It is people who refuse to face and repent of their own sins that form and promote vengeful and heretical analogs of real Christianity. One of the truly great errors of the Western formulation of Christianity (Catholic or Protestant) is to reduce the Living God and salvific communion with Him to a set of rules and precepts–in effect denying the freedom and salvation that He came to give. DeCartes’ infamous dictum, “I think therefore I am” set the stage for the logical annihilation of faith, communion with God and salvation. It is a testimony to God’s love and grace that despite all that we try to do to twist and deny His Victory on the Cross, it still has effective, real, ontologically salvific power. Christ is Risen from the dead, trampling down death by death and on those in the tomb bestowing life!!!
The central core of the practice of Christian faith is forgiveness. However, forgiveness does not mean blindly accepting man’s sinful state as normative and assenting in law and culture to any acts of which we are capable, in fact just the opposite. A life of forgiveness demands facing the reality of sin and working to allow the Holy Spirit to heal its effects in oneself, one’s neighbors, and one’s community. True community is formed by communion with the Holy Spirit. None of man’s attempts to ape God’s work has proved remotely successful. The transformed life is the greatest testimony to God’s real and effective grace. I suspect that one of the reasons you left the sect of Christianity you call fundamentalist was that you never found that reality. You still long for it. It does exist. I know it exists in the Orthodox Church. I assume that it can be entered into in other communions as well.
When you use the term fundamentalist as you define it you are in fact describing any and all attempts made by man to replace God with the false creations of our own mind, doing our will rather than His. It is a perfect description of any tryannical organization or school of thought. It is an insult to those of true faith and is even more pejorative than Missourian’s use of the term leftist. All of us face the temptation of tyranny because true freedom, in God, demands that we acknowledge our own sinfulness and face the fact that, as St. Paul called himself, that we are the greatest of sinners’of all people most in need of salvation and forgiveness. Attempts at moral perfection do not lead to salvation or knowledge of God. Submission to His love, repentance, and the power of the Holy Spirit leads to a deepening union with God which manifests itself in a life of moral perfection.
Michael writes: “Jim, your definition of fundamentalism assumes that all religion is nothing more than an intellecutal construct deviod of any reality beyond the mind of the men who created it.”
Well, I’m not talking about all religion; I’m talking about fundamentalism. Not all religious people are fundamentalists, although even non-fundamentalist religion can have some fundamentalist traits. In other words, it’s not black and white — there are a variety of features that characterize fundamentalism. The mere fact that a religious group has, say, male leadership does not make it a fundamentalist group.
It’s like the criteria that define a religious “cult.” Most cults do not have every single characteristic that can be associated with cults. For example, the fundamentalist group I was with for some years would probably score a 60 on a scale of zero to 100.
Michael: “The transformed life is the greatest testimony to God’s real and effective grace. I suspect that one of the reasons you left the sect of Christianity you call fundamentalist was that you never found that reality. You still long for it. It does exist. I know it exists in the Orthodox Church. I assume that it can be entered into in other communions as well.”
I think to some extent I had a transformative experience, though certainly there were a lot of other negative things that went along with it. Certainly to some extent a person who leaves fundamentalism throws out the baby with the bathwater. But some fundamentalist groups, especially the “high-demand” or cult-like groups really do injure people, sometimes permanently.
Michael: “When you use the term fundamentalist as you define it you are in fact describing any and all attempts made by man to replace God with the false creations of our own mind, doing our will rather than His. It is a perfect description of any tryannical organization or school of thought. It is an insult to those of true faith and is even more pejorative than Missourian’s use of the term leftist.”
It shouldn’t be an insult to people who aren’t fundamentalists. For those who are, well, if the shoe fits, wear it. The traits that characterize fundamentalism are fairly well-defined, even if the concept cannot be defined in an absolute sense. My objection to the use of the term “leftist” is that it attempts to discredit certain people and ideas based on the imagined or real sins of others who may have little or no relationship to the people being discredited. It would be like discrediting your faith based on the fact that certain other Christians in other times and places have done bad things, while at the same time intentionally omitting everything good that Christians have done. It’s a debating trick, nothing more, and not a particularly rational one. It’s the same tactic used by rabid anti-Christians. Plug in different people and you can condemn liberals, Americans, or bird-watchers just as easily.
Note 15: I mean “generic” in the same sense that C.S.Lewis meant “mere” in his book “Mere Christianity”. The founders were not interested in promoting the tenets of one denomination over another. It was not intended as a pejorative.
I also do not think it is a cliche to state the reality of things, and I’ve always said that the reality behind things is much more complex than most people admit. Our founders had noble ideas and a deep faith. They had many, many virtues. Nevertheless, they simultaneously held beliefs that, to me, are untenable. I do not understand how one can believe in the equality of all before God yet treat those of another race or gender in the manner they did. This is not being “revisionist”, it’s speaking the truth. I’m not suggesting that they were amoral monsters or that the Christian faith is, by corollary, farcical as well. I just do not think that we need subject the truth for the sake of ideological, religious or ethnic loyalty. You have read my criticisms of liberals, so you know that.
From the perspective of world history American and the West led the movement to abolish slavery
JamesK, you are undoubted a nice guy, but, you should do some reading about the history of slavery. Slavery was present in many cultures all over the world for millenia before America was founded. Slavery was legal in the British Empire at the time that that the American colonies were founded.
Slavery was a contentious and controversial issue in America until it was resolved through the Civil War. It was never universally accepted or universally practiced. From the very beginning many abolitionists fought the expansion of slavery into new territories and states. Really James, to suggest that the Founders were uniformly accepted slavery is truly a slander against them. Even at the time of the formation of the original colonies there were many people and some colonies that opposed slavery from the first. Not all of the original 13 colonies allowed slaves. John Quincy Adams fought against slavery after he completed his term as President. Methodists, Quakers and others opposed slavery nearly from the very beginning of America.
The Aztec and the Inca were true slave empires, enslaving their prisoners of war. The Islamic Empire of the Ummayad and the Abassid enslaved over 11 million Black Africans. This same Empire raided the shores of Europe and England and took slaves from the European population as late at the 19th century. Slavery wasn’t abolished in Saudi Arabia until 1968, got that? 1968. Slavery was fully accepted for thousands of years in classical China and Japan.
There was nothing particularly American about slavery, or the attitudes towards it. The modern movement against slavery was spear headed by an Englishmen and many people in America. The WEST was the first to abolish slavery. The abolition of slavery BEGAN inthe West and spread to the rest of the world.
Note 25. Missourian is absolutely correct. Anti-slavery began in the Methodist Church in England, as an outgrowth of the great Weslyan revival (the Second Great Awakening) in England. (For historians, this revival occured while the French Revolution was raging in France. Some historians claim it kept the French corrosion from jumping the channel.) Then it came to America where, like England, was picked up by the churches and entered larger society. I know a bit about this because it was the topic of my senior thesis in college (history major).
Slavery today is carried out chiefly by Muslims.
Note 24. James, you often commit the historical fallacy called “presentism” where the past is read through the values of the present. That’s why much of your analysis has the ring of popular culture. History is valuable because it shakes loose the assumption that many of the ideas and values we hold as absolute are in fact quite tentative (and need protection) — but we have to read history as history, not as value politics.
The Left has been quite successful in taking modern values and reading them back into history to condemn the past, thereby eroding the foundations that brought those values forward. This, in the end, undermines the values as well. This is the ideological basis of multiculturalism and one reason why Europe is intellectually and morally defenseless against Muslim cultural aggression.
It is quite ironic that so many black Americans have adopted Islam as a religion as opposed the “slave master” relgion of Christianity. Either ignoring or not knowing that it was and is the Muslims who have and continue to enslave as many black people as they can.
This is a huge problem. I see it when I go to the prisons. It seems to me that Islam provides a structure and discipline lacking in many of the inmates lives. Most of them came from the black inner cities where fatherhood has been decimated.
#28 To many in prison slavery is seen as part of a long line of oppression by whites. By adopting Islam (in both its forms in prison — the Nation of Islam and Whabbism) it is a rejection of the slave holding society that has always oppressed them.
It comes from an uninformed concept of history taught in many US schools that American slavery was the most evil form in history. If you looked at many current US history text book you’d be hard pressed to find any indication of who was the source of slaves for the colonies. In all apperances most kids come away thinking that African slavery was entirely an European activity.