All concerned preachers should get involved in the defense of our values.
This column presents a conservative viewpoint about items of interest in our community and our lives. Focus is on items impacting your pocket book, your personal freedoms, and your rights. I hope you will read the column regularly and it occasionally influences your opinions and actions.
I challenge all preachers and clerical leaders who profess to cherish basic Christian values to use their position of leadership and begin to take an active role in promoting those values and the candidates who demonstrate a suitable corresponding belief system. This is a critical time in the destiny of our nation.
Over the past five decades the advocates of the secular progressive philosophy have steadily eroded the Christian ethic of our society. Because of their growing influence, the role of religion as defined and expressed by our founding fathers in our Constitution have been distorted and redefined to reshape our society. Through these actions they have fostered a situation where the word Christmas is being excluded from that wonderful December holiday. They have caused the removal of all religious statues and plaques from public buildings, including the ten commandments.
Their influence has removed all prayer from schools. Prayers can no longer be said before school events, including ball games. Benediction is no longer a part of the graduation process. Students can not even say a blessing out loud before they eat. Our forefathers would be outraged and ashamed of our desecration of their original grand design for our nation.
The nation is almost evenly split on the issue of legalization of abortions. I blame our religious establishment for the fact that half of our citizens accept this practice. If they were actively and regularly dealing with this issue from their pulpits, many of those with positive or neutral attitudes on this subject would be following Christian guidance. They must share in the blame because of their fearful silence.
A strong family structure has always been one of the foundation blocks for our society. We have allowed that critical element to be eroded and almost destroyed during the past fifty years of progressive influence. We have reached a disgraceful point in our disintegration to where over 50% of our new babies are born without a named father. Even the most religious elements have become so brainwashed that they quietly condone “living together”, babies out of wedlock, co-ed dorms in college, shared apartments, open sexual behavior in movies and on television, vulgar music, beautiful young girls with tattooed bodies, sloppy, inappropriate dress, and a lowering of standards in our school systems. All of these are issues which our clergy should be shouting about every Sunday, Wednesday, and the days in between. Instead, too many church leaders meekly sing old religious standards, quote from the bible, and conduct weddings and funerals.
I believe they have a social obligation to
become activists. The real venue for fighting and changing these negatives within our society is through changing the composition of government at all levels. Church leaders should demand that all candidates be given a social litmus test to determine their core values and beliefs. Once the worthwhile are sorted from the worthless, those candidates should be given as much support as possible from the pulpit. If the churches really feel the anti-Christian direction of our nation is a serious problem…then they must become part of the political process. They must become activist.
Many preachers are afraid to speak out. They fear their church might lose its “tax free” status if it becomes politically active. Meanwhile Reverend Wright, the czar of the secular progressive church movement yells out “God Damn America!!” from his pulpit to a throng of excited, chanting, followers.
Congregations should encourage their religious leadership to be proactive during this time of trial and tribulation for our weakening Christian nation. If we idly sit back, we may be enabling these negative elements to shape the beliefs of our children, grandchildren and the generations to follow. We have a responsibility to our heritage to insure necessary values are part of our legacy within our families and within our society.
It was the inactivity of the moral, good elements of the German society that allowed Hitler’s “National Socialist German Worker’s Party” to take control of their government and their society. Inactivity repeated by the Christian elements within our society will enable the progressive philosophy to also misdirect and destroy our America. I challenge all church leadership to rise up, to become leaders from the pulpit, and perform their intended and expected role within our society. They need to become “do-ers” instead of merely being “say-ers”. If they will accept this challenge and begin to identify and defy all negatives within our society….they will be “Getting It Right”.
Rudiments: Odds and Ends Worth Mentioning-
● The terrible oil spill in the Gulf could impact us here in Jackson County. If the black, smelly oil reaches the beautiful sugar beaches of Panama City, and tourist no longer flocked to the area from cities north of here there would be a local effect. If the constant string of vehicles running our speed trap gauntlets on Highway 231 was reduced, the city budgets in Campbellton, Cottondale, and Alford would suffer serious shortfalls.
● (Always say something nice requirement) The 144th is coming home! Let’s all band together to make these heroes feel special when they get here. Help the Chamber in its fund drive for this purpose, and be a face in the crowd when they arrive.
Note: The opinions stated in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hatcher Publications.
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Hey Sid, I agree with you that the preachers and pastors should be screaming about this stuff. The tax thing though is very big. It would swing the door wide open to other sorts of oversight by bureaucrats once churches started paying taxes. Then they start getting tax breaks and incentives and then they are also beholden to the master. We are already dealing with issues of water management. The state has imposed almost impossible standards on the churches that dont have municipal services like water and sewer. Testing of water, new wells and holding tanks, treatment of water like a municipality, holding requirements that could serve nearly 2000 people - PER CHURCH! What needs to happen is men need to stand up and teach their children the BIBLE and raise a generation that believes on Gods word and will lead us out of this pit. Men of God today that have a calling of service on their lives need to run for and be elected to office and live by the established codes. Get a code manual and learn it from cover to cover. You can pick one up at Basfords down the hill there, or Wal mart. Some are easy reads and some are a little more difficult. You can chose from the King James version, New King James, New American Standard, NIV, and on and on. The codes in that book are certain to put us back on track. We dont need lip and eye service either, we need heart service. There is not a single situation that the county has ever faced, is facing, or will ever face that that code book doesnt have an answer to. I challenge, dare, prod and provoke the CCs to hold one meeting with that book open and never once look at Frank Baker (who is a fine man, no negativity implied here) but a pastor if they have questions. How awesome would that be? God says His word does not return unto Him void, and God says test Him to see if He is true and faithful to His word. I know plenty of pastors that would JUMP at that opportunity. Thanks for listening, er..reading
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