I grew up in Denver and am admittedly biased. I’m a Denver Broncos fanatic. In the Mile High City, the Broncos are more than just a football team; they’re an institution.

Everybody loves a comeback. Former Broncos quarterback John Elway – one of the greatest QBs in NFL history – had comebacks in his DNA. Since he retired in 1999 after back-to-back Super Bowl wins, Denver fans have been jonesing for that regular shot of adrenaline Elway provided week in, week out.

Enter Tim Tebow. In the category of, “Holy cow, can he actually do it?” no Broncos QB since Elway has delivered like Tebow has. He feels familiar. This is what Broncos fans expect. We don’t do steady. We prefer up and down, high and low until that improbable rocket launch to victory in the final seconds of the game.

Will Tebow end up an NFL great like John Elway? That remains to be seen. Opinions are all over the place. But what is certain is that Tim Tebow is more than just a sports phenomenon. He’s a cultural phenomenon.

For starters, Tebow’s very existence is somehow controversial. He’s a walking pro-life testimonial. He’s been pulling off comebacks since before he was born. Pam Tebow, Tim’s mother, courageously chose to carry baby Tim to term despite doctors’ recommendations that she abort him.

You may recall that before Tim went pro, the Christian group, Focus on the Family, commissioned an innocuous TV ad that ran during the 2010 Saints-Colts Super Bowl game. It briefly told the story of the Tebows’ pre-natal struggle. The word “abortion” was never even uttered, but a positive portrayal of childbearing was all it took.

And so began the left’s hate affair with Tim Tebow. Radical feminist groups, media-types and liberal pundits alike lost their collective noodle even before the ad ran.

Erin Mattson, vice president of The National Organization for Women (NOW), told ABC News that Tim’s story of survival was “really quite offensive. … This ad is hate masquerading as love!” she barked. Tim wasn’t dismembered alive and scraped in pieces from his mother’s womb, you see.

The New York-based Women’s Media Center launched a failed censorship petition drive to pull the ad, framing it as an “attack on choice.” Get it? Pam Tebow chose alright; she just happened to make the wrong “choice,” and dared to share about it publicly.

But as a Denver Bronco, Tim Tebow’s profile has grown exponentially. So too has the left’s hatred for him.

This is due in large part to his very open Christian faith. After each game, Tim begins by thanking God: “First and foremost, I’d like to thank my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”

And who hasn’t heard of “Tebowing,” wherein one drops to a knee in prayer?

Then there’s Tim’s favorite Bible verse, John 3:16, which he’s known to wear painted in black swaths under each eye. After the Broncos’ recent electrifying playoff win against the Pittsburgh Steelers in overtime, John 3:16 was reportedly the most popular search term on the Internet.

Remarkably, during the game Tebow passed for precisely 316 yards and averaged 31.6 yards per completed pass. The television viewing audience for the last 15 minutes of the game was 31.6 percent. This only added to the mystique.

So big was the story, in fact, that major news outlets like CNN ran the text of John 3:16 in its entirety: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

The attention that Tebow’s bold Christian faith has drawn to the Gospel message has secular “progressives” and other God-deniers tied in knots.

American Atheists, a New Jersey-based group that promotes religious cleansing from the public sphere, says that Tebow is “full of cr*p.”

“Tebow takes religion and injects it into the mix and divides the fan base,” complained David Silverman, the group’s president.

“[Religion] injects the divisive force into football,” he continued (because, absent religion, football is just a touchy-feely snuggle fest). “Why in the world are we talking about religion when we are talking about football?” he demanded.

Of course, Tim Tebow is merely doing what Jesus asks of his followers: “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32)

The problem is that secular “progressives” don’t want Christ acknowledged before anyone, period; and they endeavor to shut down or mock anybody who tries.

During the Broncos’ regular season loss to the Buffalo Bills, for instance, “progressive” troglodyte and pseudo-intellectual funnyman Bill Maher tweeted about the game, encapsulating the left’s visceral hatred for Tim Tebow in 140 characters or less: “Wow, Jesus just [expletive deleted] #TimTebow bad! And on Xmas Eve! Somewhere in hell Satan is tebowing, saying to Hitler ‘Hey, Buffalo’s killing them.'”

Jesus addressed the Bill Mahers of the world – past, present and future – on more than one occasion. In John 15:18-20, for instance, He reminds His followers: “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”

Those who belong to the world do indeed hate Tim Tebow. He stands for much of what our postmodern popular culture despises: sexual purity within the bonds of natural marriage, the sanctity of human life, selflessness, personal charity, humility and much, much more.

I mean, Tim Tebow has never even been arrested for drug possession or sexual assault, for crying out loud. We simply can’t allow children this kind of role model.

So, does God care about who wins NFL football games? Probably not. Does he care about those who play, watch and love football? Unquestionably.

Win or lose, no matter what happens with the rest of the Denver Broncos football season, one thing is for sure: people will keep talking about Tim Tebow. And when people are talking about Tim Tebow, they can’t help but talk about the profound faith that drives him both on and off the field.

In the meantime: Go Broncos!

Lessons Evangelicals Must Not Miss

The death of Christopher Hitchens on December 15 was not unexpected, and that seemed only to add to the tragedy.  His fight against cancer had been lived, like almost every other aspect of his colorful life, in full public view. He had told numerous interviewers that he wanted to die in an active, not a passive sense. Then again, there may never have been a truly passive moment in Christopher Hitchens’ life.

Long before he was known as one of the world’s most ardent atheists, he was known as a world-class essayist and a hard-driving public intellectual. Born in England, he had made his home in Washington, D.C. for three decades. His range of interests was almost unprecedented. He wrote books on subjects as varied as Thomas Paine and the Elgin Marbles. He was a predictable man of the Left when he began his journalistic career in Britain, and he remained a staunch defender of civil liberties throughout his life. Nevertheless, he broke with liberals in the United States and Britain when he affirmed the Bush Administration’s decision to wage war against terrorism in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

He could write eloquent prose, but he could also write savagely. He was a self-described contrarian, even writing a book entitled, Letter to a Young Contrarian. In that book, he described this contrarian stance as “a disposition against arbitrary authority or witless mass opinion.” In practice, for Hitchens it seemed to mean the right to attack any idea, any place, any time, no matter who might hold it.

In 2007 he launched a full assault upon theism and belief in God. InGod is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Hitchens declared himself to be the implacable and determined foe of all religious belief. Along with Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris, he became part of the Four Horsemen of the New Atheism.

Actually, his atheism had already been announced. In Letters to a Young Contrarian, published in 2001, Hitchens had written that he was “not even an atheist so much as I am an antitheist; I not only maintain that all religions are versions of the same untruth, but I hold that the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief, is positively harmful.” Hitchens did not want to be confused with amateur atheists or with “the generalized agnosticism of our culture.” No, he was the enemy of religious faith and any claim of belief in God.

God is Not Great became a best-seller — a manifesto of the New Atheism and its aggressive public presence. Hitchens distilled the New Atheism to its essence. He asserted that belief in God is not only without intellectual integrity, it is also morally corrupting. He blamed belief in God for everything from ethnic strife and genocide to opposition to science and a hatred of sexuality. Along with the other New Atheists, he delivered a broadside against all theistic belief and religious expression. Whereas the older atheists had soft-pedaled attacks on Jesus Christ, Hitchens rejected any effort to sentimentalize Christ. He wrote that the New Testament was no less violent than the Old Testament and he lambasted any claim of divine revelation. He argued that religious indoctrination is a form of child abuse and denied that belief in God is necessary to morality.

At the end of his life, fighting against the cancer that had robbed him of his voice even before it stilled his pen, Hitchens pointedly asked Christians not to pray for him, and then allowed that believers might pray for him — if it made them feel better. He also warned against any claims that he might have converted at the end of his struggle. “Suppose I ditch the principles I have held for a lifetime, in the hope of gaining favor at the last minute?” he wrote. “I hope and trust that no serious person would be at all impressed by such a hucksterish choice.” He told others that, if such reports did emerge, they should be attributed to the influence of drugs, and the loss of his mental faculties.

With all that in mind, how can I claim that evangelical Christians should learn from Christopher Hitchens? Well, consider these lessons:

1. Hitchens understood the power of ideas, and he never left a field of intellectual combat without giving his best.

Even as a boy, Christopher Hitchens understood that ideas matter. This conviction was only deepened as he was educated at Oxford University and then, as both journalist and public intellectual, entered the fray of public debate. He never ran from an idea, nor from the responsibility to defend and refine that idea in the combat of intellectual engagement. In his view, ideas rule the world, and he was determined to give his all to the cause of making certain that the superior ideas, in his view, triumphed over the inferior ideas. He never surrendered an idea with a shrug, though he was, on some issues, ready to change his mind, and to stand against his former intellectual allies.

2. Hitchens committed his life to the production of words, believing that the printed and spoken word can change the world.

As a writer and essayist, Hitchens is often compared to George Orwell, the subject of one of his many books. Hitchens’ literary production was, by any measure, prodigious. As some of his friends noted, he seemed to write faster than they could read. He wrote books, essays, and seemingly countless articles. He was a public speaker, a conversationalist, and a commentator. He wrote books and essays that aggravated, assaulted, aggrieved, and irritated. He could be eloquent, and he could be crude. He believed that the power of language drove the world of ideas, and that ideas require verbal expression. He was hardly ever quiet, and the force of his arguments was expanded and extended in time through his writings. Though Hitchens is now dead, his books remain in print and widely available, and will be so for years to come.

3. Hitchens was a man of passion and personal intensity, and he made friends across ideological boundaries.

He was, as Tom Wolfe might describe him, a man in full. His passions were fully in view, if sometimes too much so. He delighted in human company, and made friends around the world. He had a host of Christian friends, including many who had debated him. He was never boring, always interesting, and just about everyone who knew him seems to recall his personal warmth and conviviality. At the very least, even when he attacked Christianity, he did not cut himself off from all Christians.

4. Hitchens did not hide behind intellectual scorn and he did not fear the open exchange of ideas.

Generally, the New Atheists are known for their unwillingness to debate Christians, especially Christian apologists. Richard Dawkins, in particular, has brought disrepute upon his own intellectual confidence by his steadfast and condescending refusal to debate Christian apologists and intellectuals. The same could not be said of Hitchens, who was willing to debate evangelical Christians and to allow the debates to be publicized and published. He did not attempt to shut down debate by insulting his ideological and theological opponents.

5. Hitchens revealed the danger of cultural Christianity and exposure to tepid, lifeless, superficial Christian teaching.

In his childhood, Hitchens was exposed to the mild Christianity of his father and the Hitchens home. (Later in life, he discovered that his mother was, in fact, partly Jewish.) As a schoolboy, Hitchens received the customary dose of tame religious instruction. In God is Not Great, he wrote of Mrs. Jean Watts, “a good, sincere, simple woman, of stable and decent faith,” who taught him religion at his school near Dartmoor. Even as a boy, Hitchens was not impressed by her emotivist expressions of doctrine and her answers to his questions. He wrote also of a school headmaster, who seemed, among other failings, to believe that belief in God served a mainly therapeutic function. Hitchens described himself then as “quite the insufferable little intellectual,” but the damage was done. Unlike others who, as he wrote, might have rejected belief in God because of abuse or “brutish indoctrination,” Hitchens simply developed indignant contempt for a belief system that seemed so superficial and fraudulent. An exposure to tepid, lifeless, thoughtless, and intellectually formless Christianity can be deadly.

The death of Christopher Hitchens is a tragedy. That much is affirmed by virtually all the countless individuals who knew him, or knew of him. But Christians experienced the death of Christopher Hitchens with a special sense of tragedy, for we could not think of his death merely on his terms. We have no choice but to believe that Christopher Hitchens, with all of his amazing gifts, will have to face the very God he so aggressively dismissed and denied. As for that deathbed change of heart he warned us all not to hope for — we have every reason to hope that it happened in spite of himself.

For that matter, every single believer in Christ has come to believe and be saved by grace alone — in spite of ourselves.

There are important lessons to be learned from the life and career of Christopher Hitchens, and they are lessons we must not fail to contemplate. In the final analysis, Christians have far less to fear from atheists or antitheists as we do from what Hitchens called “the generalized agnosticism of our culture.” We agree with him that the question of the existence and identity of God is nothing less than the most powerful and urgent question humanity will ever confront.

For this central reason, the death of Christopher Hitchens is an absolute tragedy. And, as is often the case with such a tragedy, we dare not miss the lessons with which we are left.

Some predictions are rather safe to make. 2012 is almost certain to be a determinative year on the issue of same-sex marriage. Multiple courts appear poised to strike down the Defense of Marriage Act [DOMA] and, even more urgently, the appeal on California’s Proposition 8 at the Ninth Circuit U. S. Court of Appeals will set up a certain appeal to the U. S. Supreme Court. Given the facts of this case and the significance of the nation’s most populous state, the Supreme Court is almost certain to take the case. This sets the stage for the courts to make some determinative statement on same-sex marriage within the next several months — a decision that will go a long way toward setting the direction of the larger culture.

At the same time, the same-sex marriage issue will play a part in the 2012 presidential campaign. The reason for this is quite simple. The issue of same-sex marriage is about far more than marriage as a legal institution and about more than sexuality and personal autonomy. It is the great inescapable issue, and we will know in fairly short order what all the candidates believe about the issue.

Then again, maybe not.

President Barack Obama has done far more to advance the cause of gay rights than any previous president. His executive orders and administrative policies have granted benefits to the domestic partners of federal employees, ordered the Department of Justice not to defend the Defense of Marriage Act in the courts, and ordered the Department of State to make the rights of homosexuals a major priority and principle of American foreign policy. Beyond all that, the President led the effort to repeal the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, leading to the full integration of active homosexuals within the U. S. armed services.

But, what about the question of same-sex marriage? The President has explained that his views on the subject are “evolving.” Just a few weeks ago, the President told George Stephanopoulos of ABC News that he is “still working on” the issue. The President has clearly affirmed something like same-sex marriage, assuring a gay rights group in October that “every single American deserves to be treated equally before the law.” In that context, there is little room for seeing that statement as anything other than a call for same-sex marriage.

The President has insisted that he is not for same-sex marriage . . . yet. He undermines the Defense of Marriage Act, assures activists for same-sex marriage that he is moving in their direction, but is still “evolving.”

In the aftermath of the Stephanopoulos interview, New York Magazine stated the obvious with this headline: “President Obama Won’t Say if He’ll Stop Pretending to Oppose Same-Sex Marriage Before the Election.”

Now, The New York Times has published a major article arguing that the President is allowing his surrogates in the Administration to advance the issue for him. In “Obama Still Lets Surrogates Take the Lead as Gay Rights Momentum Builds,” reporter Mark Landler explained:

“President Obama has long relied on his oratorical gifts to ease him through tricky political situations. But on the emotionally charged issue of gay rights, Mr. Obama has been content recently to let his lieutenants do the talking. And they have said some striking things.”

On the specific issue of same-sex marriage, Landler reported: “There is little indication that Mr. Obama plans to endorse same-sex marriage before the presidential election in November, despite recent statements that tiptoe right up to that position.”

Thus, the dance continues. The reason for the President’s reluctance is clear enough. Landler nailed the rationale head-on, explaining that the President “is reluctant in an election year to be drawn into a culture-war issue — one that reliably helps Republicans turn out evangelical voters in their favor and also strikes a particular nerve with religious black voters, a bedrock Obama constituency in battleground states like North Carolina and Florida.”

This disingenuous waltz will be a hard dance to maintain, and the President must know it. Nevertheless, some political authorities in Mr. Obama’s own party are advising him to keep it going.

Interestingly, the latest of these is former President Jimmy Carter. Mr. Carter recently told the Associated Press that President Obama has endangered his re-election prospects by alienating too many voters. His words to President Obama sound like an encouragement to continue his evasive dance on the issue.

President Carter said, “If your main goal is to get re-elected, avoid a controversial subject as much as you can in the first term.”

Mr. Carter recalled that he alienated too many voters during his first term, and, as he told a group recently, was “involuntarily retired.”

Maybe that explains it all. The first Obama term is all about “evolution” on the issue. Clarity will come only after the 2012 election. Then, and only then, will the dance end.

At the very least, President Carter has helped us to see the dance for what it is.

Kwanzaa, the holiday ostensibly celebrating black history and culture, runs from Dec. 26-Jan. 1. While this relatively new holiday is honored even in some of our public schools, the origin of Kwanzaa is rarely shared with students. If schools were really concerned with education and truth, they would share the following information (all links to following quoted information are provided at the end of article):

[Kwanzaa] was created by Maulana Karenga [born Ronald McKinley Everett] and was first celebrated in 1966-1967…Maulana Karenga of the [Black nationalist] US Organization created Kwanzaa in 1966 as the first specifically African American holiday. Karenga said his goal was to “give Blacks an alternative to the existing holiday and give Blacks an opportunity to celebrate themselves and history, rather than simply imitate the practice of the dominant society.”

During the early years of Kwanzaa, Karenga said that it was meant to be an alternative to Christmas, that Jesus was psychotic, and that Christianity was a white religion that black people should shun. However, as Kwanzaa gained mainstream adherents, Karenga altered his position so that practicing Christians would not be alienated, then stating in the 1997 Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Family, Community, and Culture, “Kwanzaa was not created to give people an alternative to their own religion or religious holiday.”

In 1971, Karenga “was sentenced to one to ten years in prison on counts of felonious assault and false imprisonment”. One of the victims gave testimony of how Karenga and other men tortured her and another woman. The woman claimed to have been stripped and beaten with an electrical cord. Karenga’s former wife, Brenda Lorraine Karenga, testified that he sat on the other woman’s stomach while another man forced water into her mouth through a hose.

A May 14, 1971, article in the Los Angeles Times described the testimony of one of the women:

Deborah Jones, who once was given the Swahili title of an African queen, said she and Gail Davis were whipped with an electrical cord and beaten with a karate baton after being ordered to remove their clothes. She testified that a hot soldering iron was placed in Miss Davis’ mouth and placed against Miss Davis’ face and that one of her own big toes was tightened in a vise. Karenga, head of US, also put detergent and running hoses in their mouths, she said. They also were hit on the heads with toasters.

Karenga explained his actions by saying that one of the women he had tortured had attempted to assassinate him, but he had no evidence.

It’s not just Karenga’s background that’s troubling, it’s his beliefs as well. Bryan Weynand & James Heilpern explain that “Hidden in Karenga’s Seven Principles [of Kwanzaa], each of which is masked by a Swahili label, are his blatantly Marxist and secular views.”

Karenga is currently the Chair of the Department of Africana Studies at California State University in Long Beach.

More information is available HERE, HERE, and HERE.

On Dec. 6, 2011 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton delivered a speech in honor of International Human Rights Day which is celebrated on Dec. 10, the date in 1948 when the United Nations formally adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But as we should have expected from a representative of the fervently pro-perversion Obama Administration, Clinton used the occasion to promulgate unproven, liberal assumptions about homosexuality and Gender Identity Disorder (GID).

With the usual cunning of the Left, Clinton begins her speech by referring to the “beating, terrorizing, and executing” of homosexuals, but then with some skillful bait-and-switch rhetoric, she starts talking about undefined “discrimination.” Such a speech would be justified if Clinton were actually concerned only with real human rights abuses such as draconian laws that call for the execution of homosexuals or for acts of violence ignored by police. But anyone familiar with the incoherent world of “progressivism,” understands that moral disapproval of homosexual acts becomes “discrimination” which ineluctably results in “bullying” or “terrorizing.”

Clinton’s repeated use of the absurd comparison of race to homosexuality reveals that intelligence is no guarantee of wisdom. Even really smart people often hold ignorant and foolish ideas. Whereas race is 100 percent heritable, in all cases immutable, and has no behavioral implications that are amenable to moral evaluation, homosexuality is not biologically determined, is in some cases changeable, and is constituted by volitional acts that are legitimate objects of moral evaluation. Someone should ask Clinton to explain the ways she believes race is analogous to homosexuality.

Clinton asserts that “Because we are human, we therefore have rights. And because we have rights, governments are bound to protect them.” Of course, she spent little time explaining exactly what rights she believes all people are entitled to because they’re human. She referred ambiguously to “the full measure of liberty, the full experience of dignity, and the full benefits of humanity,” [emphasis added] which sounds benign enough. To progressives, however, such noble phrases don’t mean only freedom from involuntary servitude, free speech, or the right to vote. To homosexual activists and their ideological allies, the “full measure of liberty, the full experience of dignity, and the full benefits of humanity” demands, for example, that they be given the unilateral right to reconstruct the legal definition of marriage.

Since Clinton can’t appeal to reason, she pulls on the heartstrings of those in her audience for whom “feelings” trump moral reason: “We need to ask ourselves, ‘How would it feel if it were a crime to love the person I love?'” If there are laws somewhere in the world that criminalize “love,” I haven’t heard of them. There are countries around the world that have unjust marital laws, but marital laws — just and unjust — prohibit acts, not feelings.

Here in the U.S., we have laws that prohibit polyamorists from marrying all the people they love, but there are no laws that criminalize their love. We have laws that prohibit close blood relatives from marrying, but there are no laws that criminalize their love. And most states have just and reasonable marital laws that prohibit men from marrying men and women from marrying women, but there are no laws that criminalize their love.

Clinton alludes to the Obama Administration’s troubling intention to withhold foreign aid from countries that don’t share the moral views of American “progressives” on homosexuality and cross-dressing and of the Obama administration’s creation of a Global Equality Fund which will use $3 million of taxpayer money to fund homosexuality-affirming efforts around the world. Peter Sprigg aptly describes this as “cultural imperialism.” The Obama Administration is using our taxes to disseminate non-factual, fallacious moral, philosophical, and political propositions throughout the world.

Clinton shared that she has experienced a “deepening” of her convictions about homosexuality as she has “devoted more thought to it, engaged in dialogues and debates, and established personal and professional relationships with people who are gay.” In the past, Secretary Clinton has been open about her Christian faith, and in this speech, she shared that her “religious belief and practice is a vital source of meaning and identity, and fundamental to who” she is. One wonders if in all her dialogues, debates, and thinking, she ever seriously studied the work of scholars throughout the history of the church on the topic of homosexuality. Since prior to the late 20th Century, no Old Testament or New Testament scholar affirmed what some refer to as “gay theology,” it’s surprising to see intelligent people like Clinton (and Obama) embracing what many of the best scholars, including contemporary biblical scholars, would consider heresy.

Clinton concluded with these words: “As it has happened so many times before, opinion will converge once again with the truth, the immutable truth, that all persons are created free and equal in dignity and rights.” Ever the diplomat, Clinton implies without explicitly stating that her beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality are “immutable truths.” Whereas it is true that all humans are equal in worth and dignity, it is not true that all beliefs and behavioral choices are equal in worth or dignity. The troubling notion that permeates Clinton’s speech is that a society that honors the dignity and liberty of all must embrace the ontological and moral beliefs of homosexuals.

For progressives, powerful, persistent feelings and volitional acts — at least powerful, persistent homosexual feelings and acts — are constitutive of identity and inherently moral. For progressives, to believe such feelings are disordered and such acts immoral represents an act of illegitimate discrimination against persons. But Christians understand that in this fallen world, our feelings are disordered, our will perverted, and our intellect corrupted — hence the need for laws.

And on that point IFI agrees with Secretary Clinton who accurately stated that “progress comes from changes in laws…. Laws have a teaching effect.” The question is, will America have laws that embody and teach truth — or not?

On Tuesday, November 29th, the Springfield Nativity Scene Committee (SNSC) will hold its fourth annual “opening day” ceremony from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Illinois State Capitol Rotunda, 301 S. 2nd St., Springfield, IL (corner of 2nd St. and Capitol Ave.), where their privately sponsored and funded Nativity Scene will be put on display for the 4th straight year, right next to the Governor’s “holiday tree.” Musicians and singers from iWorship Center in Springfield will be featured. The event is open to the public.

Most Rev. Thomas Paprocki, Bishop of Springfield’s Roman Catholic Diocese, will address those gathered in the Rotunda to celebrate and bear renewed witness to the birth of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Tom Brejcha, Esq., president and chief counsel of the Chicago-based Thomas More Society, a member of the SNSC and its legal counsel, will briefly explain the constitutional rights of private citizens to erect Nativity Scenes as a form of free speech and free exercise of religion in America’s “public square”. Other SNSC members scheduled to speak include Beth Rogers of Springfield, pro-family activist; Dave Smith, Executive Director of the Illinois Family Institute; and Arlene Sawicki, a pro-family activist from South Barrington.

The SNSC is encouraging those who would like to sing Christmas carols in the Illinois State Capitol Rotunda at the site of the Nativity Scene to contact Salli Chernis at the Secretary of State’s office, Dept. of Special Events, at (217) 782-8996 for permission to do so. Choirs and/or groups may perform on weekdays from 12 noon until 1 p.m. The Thomas More Society will provide free legal help, if any is needed, at (312) 782-1680, to any individual or group of private citizens interested in putting up a similar Nativity Scene — privately sponsored and funded — in any “traditional public forum” in their own town, village or hamlet in Illinois or elsewhere, whether it’s for this year (if time permits) or for next year.

“To our knowledge, Illinois is the only state in the country to celebrate the birth of Jesus with a Nativity Scene in a State Capitol Building,” said Julie Zanoza, the new chair of the SNSC who took over the role this year after her husband, Daniel T. Zanoza, founder and first chairman of the Springfield (IL) Nativity Scene Committee, was born into Eternity on January 6th, 2011. “Dan always said ‘this Nativity Scene will stand in the Illinois State Capitol Rotunda long after we (SNSC) are gone to our Heavenly reward’.” The crèche display, consisting of marble-like figures of the Baby Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, will be on view in the Rotunda throughout the Christmas Season.

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“In God We Trust” is the national motto, even though Barack Obama told a Jakarta, Indonesia audience last November that our national motto is E Pluribus Unum (out of many, one).

At least Obama got the translation right. Al Gore once said that it meant “out of one, many.” Perhaps he was employing the same math formulas that work so well in his global warming calculations.

The real motto is, indeed, “In God We Trust,” and Congress re-emphasized this on Oct. 25, passing a resolution saying so in a 396 to 9 vote. Sponsored by Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA), the bill affirms the motto and “encourages its display in public buildings and government institutions.”

Forbes explained that the reminder was needed in light of Obama’s recasting of the motto and also because of the mysterious replacement of the motto at the National Capitol Visitors Center “with stars in a replica of the House Chamber – and cropping an actual picture of the chamber so you could not see the words ‘In God We Trust.'”

Well, the idea of affirming “In God We Trust” was too much for Jerrold Nadler, the New York progressive who represents ACORN in the House of Representatives and also the socialist Working Families Party and Occupy Wall Street.

“Here we are, back to irrelevant issue debates, the kind of thing people do when they have run out of ideas, when they have run out of excuses, when they have nothing to offer a middle class that is hurting and that has run out of patience,” Nadler said, explaining his vote against the resolution.

Nadler’s comments mirror those of President Obama, who rebuked the House and delivered this non sequitur: “I trust in God, but God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people back to work.” Translation: God wants big government to get even bigger.

Jay Carney, Obama’s spokestheologian, further mangled things by asserting that, “I believe that the phrase from the Bible is ‘the Lord helps those who help themselves.'”

Sorry, Jay, that phrase is not in the Bible, which the White House later admitted.

If you’re keeping score, besides Nadler, others voting against the resolution included Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), Rep. Judy Chu (D-CA), Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), Rep. Mike Honda (D-CA), Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA), Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA), and Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA).  Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and Rep. Melvin Watt (D-NC) voted “present.”

It’s not that Nadler opposes resolutions per se. He sponsored a resolution in 2009 commemorating the 40th anniversary of the drag queen revolt known as the Stonewall riots. He also sponsored a resolution in 2009 condemning the murder of “pro-choice doctor” and “health care provider” George Tiller, the Wichita abortionist. Tiller, who was shot to death at his church, was the nation’s leading practitioner of the gruesome infanticide known as partial birth abortion.

It’s good that Nadler is against people being shot, especially in church, but it’s curious that the Forbes resolution acknowledging America’s debt to God for our abundant blessings drives him crazy enough to take the floor to condemn it.

“This is simply an exercise in saying, ‘We’re more religious than the other people,'” Nadler nattered sarcastically. “‘We’re more godly than the other people, and by the way, let’s waste time and divert people’s attention from the real issues that we’re not dealing with,’ like unemployment.”

Well, okay. How about unemployment? Nadler reliably voted against the job creation bills that the House passed in recent months, all of which were aborted in Harry Reid’s Senate upon delivery.

And if we’re supposed to be addressing “real issues,” where is the evidence that in a time of massive unemployment and economic uncertainty, Americans are just itching to redefine marriage as two guys on a pink cake? Nadler is a chief sponsor of the bizarrely titled Respect for Marriage Act, which would dump a Capitol Domeful of cowpies right on the institution of marriage, destroying its real meaning.

It makes perfect sense that a leading progressive would hate the thought of honoring God while trashing the institution created by God as the fountainhead of families, churches and communities. Those things get in the way of the all-powerful state, which has a devil of a time creating the new socialist man while families, churches and communities are imbuing citizens with personal responsibility.

Speaking of the new socialist man, it’s also difficult to birth this creature as long as the United States still has freedom of the airwaves. That may be why Nadler in January called for re-imposing the Fairness Doctrine, the FCC’s stranglehold on broadcasters that was lifted in 1987, leading to an explosion in conservative talk shows.

If you recall, progressives were calling for “civility” and trying to blame talk radio and conservatives in general for the January 8 wounding of Arizona Democrat Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and the killing of at least six people by Nazi-inspired nutcase shooter Jared Lee Loughner at a Tucson shopping center.

However, in August, the FCC finally took the Fairness Doctrine off its books, and it remains to be seen whether progressives like Nadler will continue their Dracula impression, trying to pry open the crypt anyway, releasing the monster in a different form.

Right now, Nadler is busy siding with the Occupy Wall Street protesters over the interests of his own constituents.

Asked by the Washington Times about complaints from businesses in his district around Zuccotti Park that are experiencing loss of customers, restroom overload, broken sinks and other delights, Nadler responded, “I think businesses are being damaged a hell of a lot more by our stupid economic policies and all of us have to live with expressions of democratic demonstrations or whatever.”

Whatever, indeed.

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The Bishops of the Illinois Catholic Conference recently released a strong, but appropriate statement admonishing Governor Pat Quinn for his decision to present an abortion-rights leadership award at an upcoming luncheon. This luncheon will raise funds for Personal PAC — the state’s largest political action committee whose main goal is electing pro-abortion candidates to state and local office in Illinois.

Personal PAC’s President and CEO is Terry Cosgrove, the same Terry Cosgrove who sits on the Illinois Human Rights Commission. Cosgrove was nominated to sit on this commission by Governor Quinn. (Read more about this HERE.)

Personal PAC ran ads, sent out mailers and made phone calls on behalf of Quinn’s campaign. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, they “contributed close to $500,000 in cash and in-kind services to the governor’s 2010 campaign.”

In response to this outrage, Francis Cardinal George, Bishop Thomas Doran (Rockford), Bishop Daniel Jenky (Peoria), Bishop Edward Braxton (Belleville), Bishop Thomas Paprocki (Springfield), Bishop Daniel Conlon (Joliet) and the Catholic Conference of Illinois sent a statement to the media and others admonishing Governor Quinn’s involvement with Personal PAC’s Pro-Choice Leadership Award.

Here is the text of their statement in its entirety:

We have recently been made aware of Governor Quinn’s decision to present a Pro-Choice Leadership Award at an upcoming event for a political organization known as Personal PAC. This organization describes itself as a “political action committee (PAC) dedicated to electing pro-choice candidates to state and local office in Illinois.” Personal PAC has raised and spent millions of dollars in this effort and supports the lobbying efforts of Planned Parenthood in Springfield.

We deeply regret the Governor’s decision to present this award, which so closely associates him with a political action group whose purpose is contrary to the common good. With this action, Governor Quinn has gone beyond a political alignment with those supporting the legal right to kill children in their mother’s wombs to rewarding those deemed most successful in this terrible work.

Pope John Paul II asked in his Letter to Families (1994), “How can one morally accept laws that permit the killing of a human being not yet born, but already alive in the mother’s womb?” Governor Quinn not only accepts these laws, he promotes them and publicly presents awards to their advocates. This approach is irreconcilable with any honest profession of the Catholic faith. While we deeply regret and oppose his actions, we continue to pray for his conversion and the protection of unborn human life.

To our Catholic institutions statewide, we reaffirm our desire and policies that those acting in the manner of the Governor should not be given special recognition on Church property or at functions held in support of Church ministry.

Earlier today, Quinn responded to this statement by saying “I am going to the event to present an award to a woman who was a victim of rape and who is a very strong advocate of helping rape victims all over our state [and] our country. I really feel that’s a proper, Christian thing to do to honor someone who’s doing someone [sic] that helps the community at large.”

The Catholic Conference of Illinois was quick to respond. “Governor Quinn’s statement today that he is recognizing a rape victim for her advocacy work dodges the issue. Our hearts go out to any victim of rape, one of the most personally violent crimes against women,” said Mary Massingale, director of communications.

“He is presenting an award – titled the Pro-Choice Leadership Award – at an event hosted by Personal PAC, an organization that describes itself as a ‘political action committee (PAC) dedicated to electing pro-choice candidates to state and local office in Illinois.’ This action is irreconcilable with any honest profession of the Catholic faith, and it is what prompted the Bishops’ statement.”

Take ACTION: Send a “thank you” to Cardinal George and the Catholic Conference of Illinois for their strong but appropriate statement in defense of unborn human life.  You can also call the Catholic Confrence’s office at (312) 534-8230.

Over the course of more than two hundred years of United States history, there are moments that are indelibly etched in the collective memory of our nation. September 11, 2001 marks one of those moments that is vividly and painfully seared in the consciousness of not just Americans but people around the world as well.

High school and college students, stay-at-home moms, working men and women, seniors and retirees-everyone has a story to tell about when they heard, or worse, saw the news reports of the first 767 jet crashing into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City, followed seventeen minutes by a second jet crashing into the South Tower. By mid-morning all America was reeling from the reports of additional plane crashes at the Pentagon and a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

On the morning of September 11, I was preparing to go to work when I heard about the first plane crash. I assumed that this was a horrific accident similar to the tragedy in 1945 when a B-25 bomber crashed into the Empire State Building. Pulling into the parking lot at work, I heard about the second crash and realized it couldn’t possibly be a coincidence that two planes would strike the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center within minutes of one another. As the memory of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing came to mind, I realize that these incidents were targeted, terrorist attacks.

In those mind-numbing moments, life in America turned upside down. United States airspace was shut down: no civilian planes, private or commercial, were allowed to take off; all planes in flight were ordered to land as soon as possible; and all international flights bound for the U.S. were diverted to Canada and Mexico. Government buildings, airports, national landmarks, and shopping malls were either evacuated or voluntarily closed. Radio and television stations quickly moved to a continuous news format, and the public tuned in and stayed tuned in.

As the day wore on, an eerie quiet descended as many people opted to stay home with family, glued to their televisions. Police departments reported a decrease in crime in the aftermath of 9/11-even criminals were staying home, listening to the reports from Ground Zero and watching the endless replay of the jets crashing into the Twin Towers. As one policeman told me, “even the bad guys were scared by the terrorist attacks.”

Yet many others sought the fellowship of believers as churches opened their doors for corporate and individual prayer. Members of Congress gathered on the steps of the Capitol in the evening of 9/11, vowing unity and spontaneously singing “God Bless America.” President Bush officially proclaimed Friday, September 14, as “National Day of Prayer and Remembrance for the Victims of the Terrorist Attacks on September 11.” All across the country pastors led their people in prayer. Even people who weren’t regular church attendees were drawn to church and were comforted by the Word of God:

God is our refuge and strength,
A very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear,
Even though the earth be removed,
And though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea;
Though its waters roar and be troubled,
Though the mountains shake with its swelling.
Psalm 46:1-3

On September 11, 2001, we watched as two man-made mountains of steel and concrete crashed down along the banks of the Hudson River. Smoke and ash billowed from the wreckage, filling the streets of Lower Manhattan and defiling the brilliant blue of that cloudless September sky. Fear and confusion were on the faces of people as they fled the devastation. The scene in New York City was like the terror and destruction described in Psalm 46. Yet just as the psalmist knew that God was his refuge and strength, his help whenever he needed Him, we know that we can claim those truths for ourselves as well-not just on September 11, 2001, but today and every day.

The U.S. government has implemented many procedures, policies, and programs in the wake of 9/11 to ensure the safety of its citizens. We now have no-fly lists, enhanced (and often intrusive) screening at airport security checkpoints, numerous limitations on items that can be packed in carry-on bags, and other restrictions that aim to guarantee that there will never be a repeat of 9/11. Osama bin Laden has been killed and many other high-level al-Qaeda members are either dead or have been captured.

Ten years after the tragedy of 9/11 we might believe we have every reason to feel secure in the government’s ability to keep us from harm, but if we put our trust in the power and abilities of man, our faith is surely misplaced. The psalmist writes that: “God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear.” It is because of who God is and what He is able to do that we are able to face the worst without fear.

Across the state and nation this weekend, in church services and in local memorial services, we will once again lift up prayers for our nation, leaders, first responders, and for our soldiers as we collectively and appropriately remember 9/11. These prayers need not — must not — be relegated to moments of crisis or solemn observations of tragedies. Christians across the state should pray daily for our nation and our leaders. We should pray for direction, wisdom, understanding, protection, and God’s hand of conviction.

The events of 9/11 and all that we have endured as a nation since to remind us that ultimately our only safety, our eternal security, rests solely with God. If faced with the choice between reliance on the limited and flawed power of man or the limitless and perfect sovereignty of our omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God, how could one not choose God? Praise God that we can rest secure in the closing words of Psalm 46:

Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth!
The LORD of hosts is with us;
The God of Jacob is our refuge.

Living in the “information age” and in a time of unprecedented technical achievement, it is difficult to explain the disconnect of many Americans between their actions and the consequence of those actions. Those of us who turn to the Bible for wisdom take it from God that “whatever a man sows, that shall he also reap.” In scientific terms we understand that, “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Much of the pain people experience is simply due to bad choices they have made.

Whether we are discussing the disruption of life that drug use brings, the anger and pain of children who are the victims of a divorce, or the conflicts like that in Madison, Wisconsin, all are the result of people making wrong-headed decisions and later suffering the consequences. Yet rather than changing one’s direction or making wiser choices, many become whiners or, worse yet, demand that someone else bear the burden for their bad decisions.

One painful part of child rearing is witnessing the little one’s learning how to walk and run. In short order their shins become covered by bruises as they stretch the limits of their balance and strength. We understand that such pains are part of growing and learning.

However, many people appear to equate the amoral bruising of the toddler’s shins after a fall to the suffering which is consequent to choices that traditionally have been considered immoral. They see the pain that fills peoples’ lives following certain activities as just a part of life. One must merely get up, brush off the dust and keep going. In other words, they see no moral implications in the suffering which follows premarital sex, adultery, drug use, abortions or homosexual conduct. In fact, they argue that the discomfort they experience following such behavior is due exclusively to the preaching and moralizing of Christians. They claim that if Christians would be silent regarding others’ conduct they would experience no guilt and be very comfortable and happy in the lifestyle choices they have made.

However, this ignores the fact that all of us make decisions on a regular basis of which others disapprove yet we experience no moral qualms. There are multitudes who believe that gun ownership and hunting are inherently immoral, even wicked. In fact, the general public opinion would probably lean quite decidedly against hunting at this time, yet I find no guilt in participating in either over the years. One could make the case that political correctness is so powerful in America that many traditional activities have become quite unpopular, but those activities continue to be practiced by many without moral qualms. It is clear that there is an innate sense of guilt attached to some behaviors while others, regardless of the attempts by some to render them “immoral,” remain acceptable. It is not our moralizing that produces the guilt but the inherent immorality of the conduct.

Witnessing a homosexual parade or trying to help the children suffering the agony of their parent’s divorce educates one quickly if our eyes and hearts are open. These actions are and will remain immoral and unsupportable regardless of their “acceptance” by society because they are inherently contradictory to Scripture, nature, and the best interests of people, especially children.

God knew exactly what He was doing when He created us “male and female,” and introduced marriage as the only safe and appropriate venue for sexual activities.

The increasing demands for “therapy,” alcohol and drug abuse, and the tragic uptick in cases of depression, suicide and other anti-social behaviors merely reflect our penchant to self-destructive conduct. We are reaping what we have sown, and no scapegoats can alleviate the pain.

Maybe humbling ourselves before our loving Creator would be a good first step to real joy.

Illinois U.S. Representatives Don Manzullo and Peter Roskam and 40 of their colleagues in Congress are calling on President Barack Obama to acknowledge America’s Godly heritage.

Manzullo and Roskam co-signed a letter asking President Obama to correct remarks he recently made in Indonesia where he referred to America’s national motto as “E Pluribus Unum — out of one, many.” The actual national motto, adopted by Congress in 1956, is “In God We Trust.”

The letter also raised concerns about recent presentations by Obama in which he has excluded the word “Creator” from his recitation of the opening lines of the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration states that we are “endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights.” On three occasions in the last month Obama has deleted the word “Creator” from his quotes from America’s founding document.

“Once may be a mistake, but three times is a pattern,” said U.S. Representative Randy Forbes (R-VA), the chief author of the letter and chairman of the Congressional Prayer Caucus. “By misrepresenting things as foundational as the Declaration of Independence and our national motto, the President is inaccurately reflecting America and undercutting important parts of our nation’s history.”

Forbes and his co-signers point out in their letter that founder John Adams believed that “it is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand.”

Their letter to Obama says, “If Adams was right, by making these kinds of statements to the rest of the world, you are removing one of the cornerstones of our secure freedom. If we pull the thread of religious conviction out of the marketplace of ideas, we unravel the tapestry of freedom that birthed America.”

Obama’s incorrect reference to the national motto follows a recent episode involving the new lavish Visitors Center at the U.S. Capitol. When the new Center was unveiled, it included a major exhibit which also falsely declared that “E Pluribus Unum” is our national motto.

It took Congressional intervention to get the exhibit revised to include the true version of the national motto.

Missouri State Attorney General Chris Koster has called for the reversal of a federal court decision declarinig the National Day of Prayer unconstitutional. Koster has joined 28 other state attorneys general in filing a “friend-of-the-court” brief with the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals opposing the decision.

Illinois’ Attorney General, Lisa Madigan is noticeably absent in defending the First Amendment’s guarantee of “free exercise” of religion.

You may remember that U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb of Wisconsin ruled in April that Congress violated the First Amendment to the Constitution when it established a designated National Day of Prayer in 1988. Congress passed legislation that year designating the first Thursday in May for the national observance of a Day of Prayer. Judge Crabb ruled that such an observance amounted to an unconstitutional establishment of religion. The suit was filed by the anti-God group kn own as the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

The brief filed by these States Attorneys General argues that federal courts have repeatedly acknowledged the country’s religious heritage and the integral role of religion in American public life. The brief points out that every President except one since George Washington has issued a proclamation calling for national days of prayer and thanksgiving to God.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott led the effort to enlist his colleagues from across the country in calling for the reversal of Judge Crabb’s reckless ruling. Abbott insists that the federal law does not run afoul of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment because “no citizen is required to participate in any religious activity, and no government body or official is directed to conduct any religious activity.”

Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins says that the federal court decision is the latest threat to religious liberty in the United States. “Since the conception of our nation, Americans have enjoyed religious freedom and the right to gather voluntarily for prayer. Judge Crabb’s ruling squelches the religious freedom our Founding Fathers chose to protect in the Constitution and advances an activist agenda to hide our religious foundation.”

The National Day of Prayer Task Force has organized a petition drive urging President Obama to instruct the Justice Depatment to mount a vigorous defense on behalf of the National Day of Prayer in federal court. Leading legal advocates for religious liberty have expressed concern that the legal defense mounted so far by the Obama Administration has lacked intellectual rigor. You can sign the petition to President Obama by following this link:
NDP Petition.

It has become an up-side down world. Arguments are being made, and heard, that a generation ago would have been considered absurd. Groups espousing homosexuality get favorable press while the Boy Scouts are excoriated. Marriage is mocked, honesty is considered naive and lying is “smart.” Cultural “leaders” teach that abstinence is “prudish” and promiscuity is “normal.”

America is in trouble.

If you have ever driven in a blizzard, you may have experienced a “whiteout.” It is a situation where you can see nothing but the blowing snow in all directions. Imagine flying a plane in such a situation and you understand how a pilot could become disoriented, lose his bearings and crash.

There is a parallel in the moral realm. It occurs when people reject objective standards of right and wrong, question long held principles and lose their bearings. They become confused regarding cultural mores that may have existed for centuries. If a winter “whiteout” is dangerous for a pilot, a moral “whiteout” is the death knell of a culture and civilization.

America is in the midst of such a whiteout at this moment due to a constant barrage of propaganda from the cultural left over the last fifty years. While many of our social problems have existed for a long time, i.e. poverty, teen pregnancies, crime, failed inner cities, high suicide rates, and abortion; their dramatic increase over the last four decades can be traced directly to the confusion that has been created by discarding the principles which were once foundational to American culture.

It seems the Left has used two primary arguments for throwing away these principles, but neither holds up under scrutiny. First, they declare that there is no such thing as “absolute truth.” Their statement, however, is self-contradictory, being an absolute itself! While they may wish for such an existence, in the real world there are absolutes, and we all know it. Elementary common sense would suggest that we accept the existence of absolutes and live accordingly. America, from its founding, accepted Judeo-Christian principles as its foundational absolutes. All of our laws and liberties spring from them, and to eliminate those absolutes from the general understanding of the public undermines all laws and liberties.

The second argument liberals make is that judeo-Christian principles have worked very badly for America and the world. They attempt to prove this, however, by a badly revised telling of our history. Take their word for it and you will believe that America has been a nation of thugs who have exploited and destroyed all that we have touched. Besides the fact that such a telling of American history is both false and deeply offensive to the many Americans whose contributions to the world are legion, it leaves many young Americans demoralized and uncertain.

It is appropriate to acknowledge that America has one too many occasions failed its principles. The failure is not due to poor principles but rather to the common weaknesses of human beings. And while America’s failures are to be regretted and have tainted our history, this nation’s contributions to mankind are remarkable.

But, liberalism’s relativism has created a moral whiteout in America. As a result, children are not safe in the womb, their neighborhoods or schools. We are not sure whether homosexual behavior is “normal” or not, marriage is more to be mocked than appreciated, and sexual activity is recreational. Clothing is becoming optional, and far too many people are taking justice into their own hands. These are not the marks of a stable culture but of chaos. After all, if each of us must determine what is right for ourselves, show me how the bully, anarchist or terrorist isn’t doing just that! In a nutshell, it could be argued that the picture being painted by the leaders of the cultural Left is something like this: Christianity is bad, anything anti-Christian is good. Hard work is not to be rewarded, “victim-hood” is legitimate. Businessmen and profit are bad, wealth must be redistributed “equitably.” Liberty is bad, government control is good. (Underlying the last two is the incredible assumption that people who work in government are somehow immune from the failures that characterize the rest of us!)

Behavior that our grandparents would not have tolerated for a moment is now commonplace. With the confusion created by the Left, in discarding the common principles which we have shared for over two hundred years, it is not surprising that instability prevails.

If we are to continue down this path, we will have to discard the Constitution, its protections and liberties because it was written for a people who agreed on certain fundamental truths. When enough Americans reject the foundation, the building will collapse. Are you ready for that?

Institute on Religion and Democracy

“Leaders of the PCUSA are still confused about the biblical teaching on marriage and sexuality. But we can take comfort that people in local Presbyterian churches do uphold the teaching.” — Alan Wisdom, IRD Vice President for Research and Programs, Director of Presbyterian Action

The 2010 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) took two actions late yesterday that pointed in opposite directions regarding the denomination’s decades-long debate over human sexuality. On the one hand, the PCUSA commissioners meeting in Minneapolis voted to send out for ratification in local presbyteries another constitutional amendment to delete the denomination’s standard requiring church officers to exercise “fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness.” On the other hand, the assembly turned aside attempts to convey the PCUSA’s blessing upon same-sex marriages.

The votes were close, reflecting the divided state of the denomination. The deletion of “fidelity and chastity” passed by a 53 to 46 percent margin. The proposals to redefine marriage were sidelined in a 51 to 49 percent vote. The assembly voted instead to send out for study around the denomination two documents on civil union and Christian marriage, one upholding the church’s confessional teaching on the marriage of man and woman and the other putting all views of marriage on a level and urging “mutual forbearance.”

The “fidelity and chastity” standard has been the subject of 4 nationwide presbytery votes in the last 14 years. It has been affirmed in all those votes.

Alan Wisdom, IRD’s Vice President for Research and Programs and Director of its Presbyterian Action committee, commented:

“These votes are not a cause for rejoicing. Leaders of the PCUSA are still confused about the biblical teaching that channels sexual expression through the marriage of man and woman. But we can take comfort that people in local Presbyterian churches do uphold the teaching. They have proven that in 4 votes over the past 14 years to confirm the ‘fidelity and chastity’ standard for church officers. It is unfortunate that we will have to summon them again to defend that biblical standard in another set of presbytery votes over the coming year. But defend it they will.

“The decision to shelve attempts to redefine marriage was a relief. The sexual revisionists had seemed to have a solid majority to enact their agenda at this assembly. They had taken down ‘fidelity and chastity’ and they were gunning for marriage last night. But somehow, by God’s grace, they came up short. The commissioners took a second look and decided that they weren’t ready to tinker with this sacred institution established by God in creation and blessed by Jesus himself. We give thanks for that reprieve, but know that we have much work to do in helping Presbyterians and others to reappropriate the beautiful heritage of biblical teaching about how God brings together man and woman in marriage.”

President Barack Obama is sold out to the radical homosexual agenda. One needs no more proof than his most recent pro-homosexual gesture, recognizing homosexual partners raising children in the official White House Proclamation on Father’s Day:

Nurturing families come in many forms, and children may be raised by a father and mother, a single father, two fathers, a step father, a grandfather, or caring guardian.

Yes, you read that right. The President of the United States of America went out of his way to pander to the homosexual community by recognizing two-daddy homes (read motherless) on Father’s Day.

What the President refuses to acknowledge is that the family is God’s idea. It is a sad fact that in this fallen world children are sometimes raised by single parents or grandparents, but being raised in a climate of homosexuality by two men — or two lesbian women — subjects children to a cruel social experiment and denies the real need and benefit of having both a mother and a father. It wasn’t too long ago that this type of a household would have been considered the ultimate in dysfunction. Today, our radically liberal president embraces this dysfunction as just another form of “family”. We really shouldn’t be surprised, this is part of the “change” he promised on the campaign trail in 2008.

Obama also used this cherished American holiday honoring fathers and fatherhood to make a statement about his views of when life begins. In the first few words, the Obama proclamation declares a father-child bond commencing “from the first moments of life.” In so doing, Obama refuses to acknowledge that life begins at the moment of conception, when a unique human life with unique human DNA, begins. Nor does he acknowledge the fact that millions of fathers view their unborn children in ultrasound pictures well before they are born.

It is also interesting to note that Pres. Obama and his leftist friends aren’t observing Gov. Mitch Daniel’s foolish call for a truce on the social issues. Instead the Left is happy to shove them in our face.

While so-called “moderates” and fiscal conservatives shrug their shoulders, the morality of the people and nation suffer.

Charles Carroll, signer of the Declaration and member of Continental Congress warned us:

“Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime and pure, which insures to the good eternal happiness, are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments.”

Reject the morality of Christian conservatives and get instead the morality of the godless Left.