Okay. So I missed this, oh, two weeks or so ago. Doesn't surprise me. Probably wasn't in the local newspaper, and I no longer take a local newspaper. So...
At the Washington, D.C.'s 10th annual National Catholic Prayer Breakfast, Dr. Robert P. George, a leading "Christian thinker" in America, said, "It's no longer easy to be a faithful Christian" in America. George reminds us that, "They will despise us if we refuse to call good evil and evil good." He said that the "derision that comes from being pro-life and pro-traditional marriage," is the reason for all this un-easiness. "Because of that, Christians must be willing to bear the consequences of standing up for the teachings of Jesus and his bride, the Church."
There you go. I'm starting to think I should feel persecuted against.
Look, I've got news for any and all. It has never been easy to be a "faithful Christian." That's why we had blue laws and such when I was young. It was a law that prohibited stores being opened on Sunday. Sabbath and all. The ones who weren't Christian put up such a fuss, the law went the way of the albatross. Christians, well, we needed things on Sunday, also. So, soon we began to dig right on into the un-Sabbath Sabbath.
Don't tell me differently, or I might feel persecuted.
See, the difficulty in being Christian comes from within. All our personal baggage and personal temptations far outweigh, in this country at least, the chance of being, you know, penalized for being Christian.
Sure, Tim Tebow was a pariah for his religious beliefs when he was an NFL player and gay man Michael Sams is getting a documentary and people are talking about his courage for coming out and such, but really, is that being persecuted?
I'm pro-life and pro-traditional marriage and nobody wants to hear that. I don't feel persecuted. I feel I have the right in this country to believe what I will, and the majority of this country has the right to tell me I'm wrong. I'm cool with that. But I don't feel persecuted.
No. Persecuted is living in Iran and accepting Jesus as Lord.
No. Persecuted is being a young woman who accepts Jesus as Lord (and wants and education) in Nigeria.
Persecution isn't not being able as a teacher to talk about Jesus to someone in the class. It's just not. It's not particularly right, but that's a tale for another time.
Not a week passes where we don't get up in arms as a Christian community about stuff like the Affordable Care Act.
What we need to do is instead of complaining about persecution in this country, we start recognizing persecution around the world and see if we can prayerfully do something about that. Or maybe we can notice the hungry down the street. Or maybe we can go to the prisons and preach Jesus. Or maybe we can see the youth walking around with nothing to do and do something good about it. Or maybe we can stand outside the schools, across the street from the schools and hand out Bibles to parents who are picking up their kids. Or ....
No, it's hard to be a Christian in this country. Because Jesus said it would be. It's always been. It will always be.
That's the weight of a cross. To paraphrase the master, "Why worry about the speck of persecution in your neighbor's eye when you have a locomotive-sized persecution stick in your own?"
2 comments:
Ah, but it is the American way to claim persecution. Make me see a nativity scene in a public place? Cry persecution by the Christians. Don't allow me to impose my prayer on a government-sponsored captive audience? Claim persecution against the Christians. Religious freedom is a 2-way street It is a shame that some people on both sides of the issue refuse to acknowledge this.
Well said, Billy! And well said, Roger.
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