The Masked Conservative

For over a century, the Statue of Liberty stood in New York Harbor proudly extolling American values to the world, even doing so defiantly in the face of those finding this country an affront to their despotic aspirations and morays. However, as factions within the government conspire to use the war on terror as a smokescreen behind which to continue the transformation of the American people into docile minions of conformity, it seems Lady Liberty no longer stands quite so bravely because her caretakers compel her to cower before the forces of evil from both within and without this great nation.

Since the 9/11 attacks in 2001, access to the statue has been curtailed and severely limited. The interior of the landmark was closed for nearly three years following the terrorist incident. And as with other aspects of American life, from that day forward the tragedy was invoked as an excuse one could not question without having one’s patriotism assailed to keep the upper reaches of the statue off limits in perpetuity.

In 2004, the Park Service begrudgingly reopened parts of the complex. However, to symbolize our status as pawns of the totalist state, visitors are only allowed now to go as high as the pedestal on which Lady Liberty stands.

Such a limitation brings to mind one or two apt metaphors.

First, one might say being forced to stop beneath the statue’s feet is comparable to Orwell’s symbol representing the future of a boot forever pressing down around the neck of mankind. Second, being forced to look up Lady Liberty’s skirt at where her unmentionables would be if she was a real dame reminds freedom loving people everywhere of the numerous perverts holding elected and bureaucratic office that derive a voyeuristic pleasure rummaging through metaphorical underwear drawers all in the name of homeland security in pursuit of information to which these authorities have no right or legitimate purpose.

After the Bible, probably one of the best sources of insight into human nature is none other than “The Simpsons“. In one scene fraught with prophetic implications that one had to laugh at or you’d end up crying because deep down you just know that someday it will probably come true, giant robots reminiscent of the Sentinels from the X-Men were shown whipping tourists (or prisoners since with the amount of surveillance these days in public places its increasingly difficult to make the distinction) as they file past the Capitol and Washington Monument.

If the American people are to be forbidden from enjoying Lady Liberty to her fullest, then why should we be compelled to pay for her upkeep? For as a holding of the National Park Service, isn’t the statue maintained for the enjoyment of the American people?

If not, just go ahead and sell her altogether to the highest bidder like some barroom floozy as was predicted on an episode of Dark Angel. At least that way we’ll be done with the hypocrisy.

To shame those opposed to open borders, those locked behind their gated communities and walled estates in need of an unending stream of cheap illegal labor tell us, if the Statue of Liberty is to continue as a beloved symbol of the United States, immigration must continue unabated. Ironically, had those coming to our shores (who actually wanted to be Americans unlike the immigrants of today) had caved so easily to their fears in a manner similar to that which these very same elites counsel in reaction to terrorism they would have never come here in the first place.

Don’t we owe it to their memory to keep access to the Statue of Liberty as free as her name implies?

Though one does not want to unduly interfere with the affairs of an autonomous church and though I am ambivalent about lady preachers, I can’t help but feel that a 81 year old Sunday school teacher dismissed in large part because she is a woman has somehow gotten a raw deal.

What makes this case most vexing is not so much that the church in question forbade women from the get-go from ascending to positions of dogmatic instruction but that this lady was relieved of her duties after fifty years of service.

So why was it OK for her to be teaching all this time then all of a sudden her classroom ministrations transfigured into an ecclesiastical outrage that could no longer be countenanced?

Though I cannot be absolutely certain, methinks I catch a whiff of Purpose Driven Warrenism in the air or at least the stench of the church growth movement.

On the August 24, 2006 edition of The Albert Mohler Program, listeners learned that the pastor came to the First Baptist Church of Watertown, New York in 2004. If female Sunday school teachers were such an abomination to this minister but were permitted by this church, shouldn’t he have done the chivalrous thing and not accepted this particular pastorate to begin with?

The pastor claims that, after his arrival, the church began to experience a period of growth and this ruffled the feathers of some longstanding members. If this follows the pattern of this phenomena taking place in other churches across the country, this means rock music and jungle rhythms were probably introduced to attract a bunch of tattooed and possibly lice-infected young people more interested in dancing and carousing than actually worshipping God.

According to the Syracuse Post Standard, much of the stink stems from opposition to the pastor’s removal of a stain glass window and crosses in the church (can’t exactly have those scruffy hooligans feeling guilty about their sins, now can we, since that would hamper their self esteem). Part of church growth operational policy is that a church should not look like a church but rather like a rec center or a pub (and probably a brothel in a few years if the seeker sensitive trend continues much longer).

Standard Purpose Driven strategy in such a situation would be to neutralize the resisters by getting those whose egos have been stroked with the offer of ecclesiastical offices and honors to swear allegiance to the pastor and purge from membership those retaining their integrity through no unquestioning loyalty to no one but King Jesus. Makes you wonder if the problem with a lady Sunday school teacher in her 80’s is not so much that she’s a lady but that she’s in her 80’s and not led around as easily with a ring in her nose as someone considerably younger. According to one witticism popular among Purpose Driven theorists open to different interpretations is that the pillars hold up the church.

Though he was reluctant to discuss the matter in initial press accounts, the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Watertown was finally man enough to admit on the Albert Mohler Program that more than the teacher’s plumbing was taken into account in this personnel matter. She was also let go since she was deemed not sufficiently submissive to the pastor and his cronies.

This matter of whether or not a woman should be allowed into positions of doctrinal authority within the church is indeed a serious matter. However, are all the other ducks in a row at this church as well?

Is the pastor going to take a similar hardline position against those whose divorces were acquired under less than Biblical guidelines? Given that the First Baptist Church of Watertown is a member of the American Baptist Churches USA, one would think this pastor would have weightier matters to consider like whether or not a pastor so concerned about a literalist interpretation of Scripture should even be a part of that particular denomination, convention, association, or however else you want to classify it.

For you see, the American Baptist Churches USA is involved with a number of matters that make the scandal of a lady Sunday school teacher seem quaint by comparison. For starters, the American Baptist Churches USA is a member of the National Council of Churches, a group of borderline Communists cutthroats in clerical collars that make the rogues in the bar scene from Star Wars look ethical. Furthermore, a number of American Baptist USA congregations just about endorse homosexuality.

It is not like heresy is anything new to the American Baptist Churches USA and struck the leadership of the First Baptist of Watertown unaware. After all, one of that denomination’s foremost personalities was none other than Martin Luther King, Jr.

While Martin Luther King might have done a commendable job for the cause of civil rights, he was hardly a font of orthodox Christian doctrine. According to columnist and pastor Chuck Baldwin, King denied essential Christian doctrines such as Christ’s deity, the Virgin Birth, and the physical resurrection (in other words, those very things that make Christianity worth messing with in the first place). Furthermore, King’s association with reported Communists and similar subversives has been well documented.

I wonder if the Pastor of First Baptist of Watertown would have the courage to put the smackdown on Dr. King or is that just something he does to old ladies? After all, unlike denominational bigwigs and assorted pressure groups, little elderly grandmother-types don’t have much ability to yank the purse strings shut or block access to the other niceties of positions those deriving their livelihoods from emolumented parsonships often crave.

Though this debate within the church makes for an interesting back and forth, probably even more disturbing is the response coming from the town mayor. Since the pastor also sits on the town council, the mayor felt it was his place to weigh in on the debate with the following comments: “If what’s said in that letter reflects the councilman’s views, those are disturbing remarks in this day and age. Maybe they wouldn’t have been disturbing 500 years ago, but they are now.”

Since this community apparently employ part time alderman, does the mayor speak out on personnel disagreements taking place at the day jobs of the others sitting on the council? More importantly, does the major plan to speak out against other religious organizations and groups that do not allow women to assume the highest levels of authority?

Since the mayor thinks he is some kind of equal opportunity crusader by kicking around the pastor of the local Baptist church, does he have the guts to take on the local Catholic church or is he just too afraid to take on the Vatican? Better yet, is he big and bad enough to take on the Muslims when they come to town as many times in that religion women aren’t only banned from positions of authority but also barred from the very act of public worship. They only thing the mayor should be worried about is whether or not the church is in compliance with the fire code or if members take over too many parking spaces on the street.

The pastor claims that God intended men and women to fulfill different roles within the church, and for the most part he is correct. But as my grandmother Louise Schwartz use to say, the man might be the head but the woman can sure twist his neck. So the next time he calls upon the ladies of the congregation to prepare the pancake supper or whatever else the gastronomically carefree gorge themselves on at such functions these days, perhaps these women of conscience should flat-out refuse pointing out it is not their place to cook promiscuously for all kinds of men to whom they are not married.

For if we are to adhere to such an airtight interpretation of Holy Writ, does it not say women are to be keepers at home? There is not one word there about being the kitchen scullions of the church. And if the pastor does not like it, tell him to take it up with the disgruntled husbands that are no doubt sick and tired these days of all these extraneous groups and Purpose Driven this study and Purpose Driven that study that act like they are more entitled to the labor of these women than the men to which such women are married.

In the spring of 2005, I wrote a column detailing what I considered a few of the shortcomings and dangers of the Emergent Church Movement. Much to my surprise, the piece sparked more of a debate than originally anticipated, full detail of which I am not privy but it must have been a real humdinger.

According to one pro-Emergent blog called TallSkinnyKiwi, since I have dared to say my peace elsewhere about tattooing, smoking, and boozing (three things Emergophiles seem to revel in with impunity), as well as enunciated differences with Presbyterians, and Southern Baptists (as if these institutions were somehow above criticism [perhaps they should be reminded about the Protestant Reformation ]), my comments about the movement ‘s grand pooba Brian McLaren are therefore out of line and not worthy of consideration.

In the spirit of ecumenical inclusion gripping much of mainstream Evangelicalism, TallSkinnyKiwi categorized my classification of McLaren as “the worst McLaren slam” making the rounds on the Internet and “This is NOT the kind of discussion we want to have, so please...no wrangling about words, no arguing, no divisiveness...Let’s have a good productive discussion that allows us all to move ahead.” No doubt headlong into the arms of apostasy. Thus, the practitioners of liturgical diversity hold the sacrament of tolerance should only apply to those agreeing with them.

My column regarding McLaren might seem utterly bizarre to minds too small to fathom the revolutionary apocalyptic changes sweeping across certain sectors of society, but I stand by my conclusions and assessments of this aberrant movement and its foremost luminary. Yet, from what I have learned since then, the situation might even be worse.

In the May 9, 2006 Sojomail ezine of the leftwing Christian rag Sojourners, McLaren is interviewed as to his opinion of The Da Vinci Code. According to McLaren, though The Da Vinci Code is lit with fallacies and distortions, these are no more serious than those in the Left Behind Series.

Though there is room for debate among committed Christians as to the specific chronology of certain eschatological events and that some of the plot elements seem needlessly drug out or somewhat silly, overall one cannot deny that the Left Behind novels depict a milieu where Jesus is Lord of the universe. The Da Vinci Code portrays Jesus as little more than a sex fiend no more divine and thus worthy of worship than the rest of us. But since in their own words a good story is more important to the Emergent crowd than cold hard fact, all that is beside the point.

What McLaren and his disciples really can’t stand is the reasonably conservative outlook espoused by the Left Behind novels. McLaren writes, “The Religious Right has polluted the air. The name ‘Jesus’ and the word ‘Christianity’ are associated with something judgmental, hostile, hypocritical, angry, negative, defensive, anti-homosexual, etc. Many of our churches, even though they feel they represent the truth, actually are upholding something that is distorted and false.”

Encase Pastor McLaren has not been off that spacious Burtonsville church compound of his surrounded by houses pushing a million dollars in prince, there’s quite a bit to be negative and angry about in the world today. Frankly, it’s that naive brand of Christianity with the sickening grin plastered across it’s face that is so emasculated that it doesn’t get upset at anything that is upholding something distorted and false.

The McLarenite beef with the Left Behind series is the way novels “twist scripture toward a certain theological and political end.” Mind you, I doubt he’s raving about a pre-tribulation rapture or the oddity of a believer chauffeuring the Anti-Christ around the globe. Rather, what McLaren is lamenting is Left Behind’s stern warning against global government and the amalgamation of world religions into a demonic mismash.

For you see, whether he wants to admit it or not, Rev. McLaren turns out to be something of a universalist deep down. For while he will no doubt dance around the matter with the obfuscation endemic to the Emergent Church movement, McLaren is out to undermine traditional belief in the afterlife, particularly the destinations of the soul popularly known as Heaven and Hell.

According to McLarenite doctrine, it doesn’t even matter if these metaphysical realms even exist and the belief in them are actually a holdover from a more primitive time, actually hindering continued spiritual progress by fostering what has become the new boogeyman constantly harangued from the twenty-first century pulpit and Sunday school classroom (namely individualism). McLaren comes close to insinuating that Jesus didn’t even believe in Hell but simply invoked the concept to best the Pharisees at their own game of verbal one-upmanship.

Instead of fearing the eternal torments of Hell and anticipating the unending happiness of Heaven, the truly spiritual person only concerns themselves about a this-wordly COMMUNITY. Frankly, if this is all there is to the Kingdom of God, I want a refund and being a Christian is a colossal waste of time.

The hyperpious might come down with a case of the vapors for me having said that, but whether they want to admit it or not, my opinion is essentially that of the Bible as I Corinthians 15:19 says that if in this life only we have hope, we of all men are most miserable.

Interesting how those in these revolutionary movements constantly counsel how we have so much to learn from foreign cultures when these alien dogmas undermine sound doctrine, traditional liberties, and private property yet so eagerly dismiss these concepts when a degree of congruity is shared with Christian belief. So what if Zoroastrians at that time had a more vivid understanding of the after life than their Jewish counterparts?

Does the idea’s origin somehow negate any of its truthfulness as apparently Jesus wasn’t the only Biblical source to endorse the notion of a punitive realm of the after life irrespective of where the idea might have gotten its initial start as the theme received its most elaborate treatment probably in the Book of Revelation. But if McLaren is going to get his knickers in a knot over Left Behind, he’s as sure as Sheol not going to like the Book of Revelation.

What good is the COMMUNITY going to do you on your deathbed as your existence is about to be snuffed out all together if Heaven and Hell really do not exist as destinations in eternity but merely as states of mind for the few brief years that each of us trod this earth? McLaren and his ilk often claim they have taken the tack they have in the name of bringing the young people back into the church. But if his message is going to be this life is all we have, why should they bother showing up Sunday morning at all because in the grim world McLaren posits (no matter how much Emergent types might try to put a smile on it with their scented candles, nose rings, and espresso bar, one is better off patterning one’s life after Hugh Hefner than Jesus Christ if tomorrow never comes.

In the field of apologetics, leadership is often taken by scholars in the discipline of philosophy as such academics are often inclined to point out the inconsistencies of various belief systems and the rational superiority of the Christian faith. While such efforts will always be at the forefront of worldview analysis, experts in the fields of history, journalism, and law more oriented towards concrete fact than theoretical reflection also have an essential role to play in defending the Christian faith and in presenting a reason for the hope that lies within the believer.

One such work exemplifying this approach that is both comprehensible to the average reader yet filled with informative detail for those of a more academic bent is The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel. Himself a former skeptic, The Case For Christ recreates Strobel’s spiritual journey where this Chicago Tribune reporter turned his journalist’s eye and trained his legal mind towards the fundamental claims regarding Jesus Christ.

Strobel recreates this process by interviewing the foremost Christian experts in the fields of ancient history, Biblical studies, and even medicine and psychology. To some, this approach no doubt reeks of a detached tedium for which many professors are infamous; however, Strobel imbues this quest with both intrigue and a touch of humanity.

Strobel assures those reluctant to commence an in depth theological inquiry that such an investigation can be exciting and does not require any esoteric mental abilities beyond the commonsense used to operate in normal everyday life. Strobel accomplishes this by beginning each chapter with an anecdote drawn from his own life.

For example, in the chapter examining the eyewitnesses for Christ, Strobel opens with the story of a teenager on a respirator, paralyzed from the neck down by a robber’s bullet, who testified to the judge and jury assembled in his hospital room of the deed done to him (48). The victim died eighteen days later.

Many of the experts interviewed by Strobel themselves have their own engaging backgrounds that the reader will find both interesting and assuring to readers that these imposing intellects are not all that different than the rest of us. For example, Lewis Lapides, interviewed as an expert on the Messiahship of Jesus, went from being born into a Jewish family, into a skeptical phase surrounded by a dope-induced haze, to embracing Christ as his savior. Particularly touching was how the Resurrection was more than an academic truth to historian Gary Habermas but rather a source of existential comfort getting him through the loss of his wife to cancer.

It is through this witty give and take that Strobel lays out the evidence of the case for Christ. Though the entire book should be read, the conclusion does an excellent job of summarizing Strobel’s main points.

Strobel comes to the following conclusions. The biographies of Jesus stand up to scrutiny as reliable history as they were not countered as being inaccurate and have been reliably preserved in that the number of manuscripts indicate 99.5% accuracy of the text (350). Furthermore, evidence regarding the existence of Christ can be found outside the Gospels such as the mention of Jesus in Josephus and archaeology confirms that the Bible is accurate in numerous small details, thus increasing the credibility of its claims in more complex matters. Strobel then proceeds from these brick and mortar issues to address the more profound theological matters such as whether Jesus was insane to claim He was the Son of God and an examination of the various alternatives to the Resurrection such as the swoon theory that fall short of both logic and evidence.

As an introductory text, The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel is bound to become an apologetic classic as it succinctly addresses the fundamental issues of the Christian faith in an engaging manner that will stimulate reflection among believers and the spiritually curious alike.