Is This The One?

Is this the one?

THURSDAY, MARCH 02, 2006

Supposedly World War 1 was the war to end all wars. Then World War 2 was. Essentially, we've been at war ever since. According to the folk at the University of Michigan, who publish a Peace and Conflict report, there are 18 countries in the world with armed conflict going on. They say that's a low number compared to past decades. And I can certainly be glad to hear that, but the tone of them is the conflict in Sudan, which is wreaking death in mind staggering numbers, and the other is the war in Iraq which seems to be accomplishing little other than guaranteeing future terrorism, and that on our soil.

But, none of those compares to THE ONE war of importance. The one you probably didn't know about, you guessed didn't you?

Thats's right, it's the newly morphed version of the war on Christmas. Mind you, according to the Liberty Counsel web site, the war on Christmas is still on!

But I have been invited to attend the "War on Christians and Values Voter Conference." How ironic.

Here is the introduction: "A war on Christians rages across the America. By attacking Christians, the left intends to destroy the remnants of Judeo-Christian morality."

Now if any of you actually read my posts, I sound fairly anti-Christian. I'm not afraid to say that I think their essentially philosophy of hierarchy, patriarchy, and dualism are dangereous to human beings. Not at all. I'll also throw out the welcome mat. This is America, where the expression of religion, I believe the founders intended an understanding of private expression, is not to be infringed upon. So worship whom you please. I in turn though, have that same right. Which is where the rub comes.

Apparently the evil liberals, and believe me, they are definitely presented that way in many fundamentalist churches, want to destroy Judeo-Christian morality. Hmm. Really.

Now I consider myself a progressive liberal. And for some odd reason I must have misplaced that memo that had our agenda on it. And I distictly remember it said that destroying the Religious Reich's morality(Ha!) was on the agenda just after morning break running up to lunch.

I think you get the picture. Now despite my caustic use of labels, used primarily to generate a response(from which I have gotten none, leading me to believe that Christianity around here is unresponsive, which in emergency medical situations means a very sick patient), I stand by my earlier statement of welcome.

But when I see things like this Conference, I realize that my very liberties are not being taken into consideration. For example, as my invite informs me, "Blasphemous 'Da Vinci Code' movie comes out in May."

Wowzers! How's that for a broadsides! A movie based on a fictional book. I read Da Vinci Code. I thought it was good. It might even be right. But does that change our Constitution? Apparently in the eyes of the Conference promoters it does.

Also, "A Navy chaplain is told he can't publicly pray in Jesus' name," and "Removal of Ten Commandments monuments." Now I partly understand where some of this is coming from, and I could get lengthy on this. But America is not the all-white Christian nation that exists in the fantasies of fundamentalists. It never was, according to the Barbary Treaty of 1797, nor intended to be according to the First Amendment of the Constitution, and never will be considering the "melting pot" of religions that America is becoming. According to a report by Cathy Lynn Grossman from 2001, "There may be more than 6 million Muslims in America today, researchers calculate, based on 2 million people who are formally affiliated with mosques, up from 500,000. They attribute the growth primarily to immigration."

But the most newsworthy finding is the determination of Muslims to make mosques "the platform for full participation in American life," says Ihsan Bagby, co-chairman of the research committee. "The Muslim community is maturing and coming into its own."

So we enter then that zone where we either eliminate prayers, or include all the divinities. Allah, Jesus, Great Spirit, Wakan Tonka, Jehovah, and the list goes on and on to represent all the difference in the indigenous tribes of North America alone, and I think you see how much work would get done after the prayers. As for the removal of the Ten Commandments, I have to ask why it is the Christians are so buggered by that. I would have thought they would be more interested in seeing the Beatitudes posted. But this amounts to the same argument, in that we recognize that the Judeo-Christian code, which is NOT the foundation for our law sysytem, is not the only code to form morality. And as I have pointed out in previous posts, it seems quite lacking and hypocritical these days. I think perhaps the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism would be more appropriate.

Finally, I was warned of this: A federal judge bans "One Nation Under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance recited by school children.

Can you imagine? The nerve of actually reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in it's original form? Never mind the fact that most elementary school kids have no idea what a pledge means, or a Republic, or what the symbolism of our flag stands for. So what are we creating here? These kids want to play, and the Pledge is then not a reminder of how great our country is, nor an inspiration. It's mindless, boring, dull. They want to play with the toys and eat the glue.

But did you catch the omission? Not mentioning the fact that the phrase "Under God" was added to the Pledge many decades after the fact? So despite all their rhetoric about liberals painting the picture skewed to the left, here's a great example of the supposed truth bearers doing the same.

Some of the attendees of this Conference "such nationally acclaimed speakers as Senator Sam Brownback, Senator John Cornyn, Congressman Tom DeLay, Gary Bauer, Alan Keyes, Phyllis Schlafly, Janet Parshall, Janet Folger, William Greene, Ron Luce and Rod Parsley."

And these are the discussions:

# Christian Persecution: Reports from the Frontlines

# The Gay Agenda: America Won't Be Happy

# The ACLU and Radical Secularism: Driving God From The Public Square

# Hollywood: Christians Through A Distorted Lens

# The Judiciary: Overruling God

# The Media: Megaphone for Anti-Faith Values

# Jews Confront The War on Christians and the Values Voter in 2006

# Taking Our Faith To The Ballot Box

Yup. This could be the one. The war to end all wars. The war that denies the truth that all mankind are created equal. That all mankind has the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Seems like old territory, doesn't it?