Mr. Turley: Your liberalism/progressivism betrays you. While I agree with a lot of what you have to say, I must point out that the Word of God has not changed, but instead is "the same yesterday, today, and forever." Thus, the definition of the family is the same for the Church as it has always been, with the confusion of its meaning merely the result of the forcing of Naturalism and Marxism upon this country by the left. Also, so-called "homophobia" is only an invention of the left, in order to demonize those who believe in the Word of God, and try to obey it. It is not homophobia but rather a demonstration of love and concern to help those deceived into that unnatural, and unhealthy lifestyle, to come out if it.

You also mention supposed bigotry by the Church while ignoring the extreme bigotry daily demonstrated by the left in its disdain for all things Christian, and the illegal attempt to destroy the freedom OF religion (which the left has tried with some success, unfortunately, to re-interpret as freedom FROM religion.) I am old enough to have been in attendance in church services held in public schools; while indeed Colson should be upset with the "social order that allows such decisions in the first place," he is also correct to decry the subversion of the courts and the cities which establish and permit these illegal decisions. The courts and the government of the cities belong to the people.

You may recall that 'school choice' is one of the ideas promoted by the Church through, perhaps, the use of vouchers. But I suspect that you really do not want the Christians to leave the school systems due to the fact that they would collapse under their own weight of Godlessness,immorality, and fiscal irresponsibility which would result from such departure; and that is leaving out the current and increasing resultant failures in Math, Science, History and other subjects (as is already being demonstrated) by the superiority and success of private and home schooling.

Dear Capt. Call,

Sorry, but your comments reflect a complete misreading of the post. Statements such as “the state, a territorial monopolist of ultimate decision-making,” are hardly endorsements of the modern secular state.

As was the case with my previous post “What is Really at Stake with the Healthcare Mandate,” what concerns me is that we in the church have yet to come to grips with the fact that, over the last two-hundred years, a tectonic shift has taken place in the basic assumptions of what it means to be human. The secular age is just that, a new and unprecedented redefinition of humanity into demographic units to be regulated and organized according to the wishes of a secular elite. The school closings, as I said, are but a microcosm of what has been taking place incrementally for the last few centuries, and I simply do not believe that Colson, with whom I would be in agreement 99% of the time, offered an apologetic that takes this massive tectonic shift into account.

What might have thrown you for a loop is the second to last paragraph. But here I am only parroting what I predicted secularists would say in response. It turns out I was right. If you go to Colon’s post at http://www.christianpost.com/news/empty-buildings-nyc-kicks-churches-out-of-schools-69722/ , this is what you will find as the first comment to the article:

"Christians introduced the virtue or tolerance into Western civilization." Right. Are we reading from the same history books? I remember what happened to the Native Americans, the slaves, women, every new people group that has moved here, and don't forget the Mayans and Aztecs. That's not to say there weren't good people who were Christians, but if you are speaking of the behavior of many of its institutions their history (or present) is not so "tolerant."

As this person demonstrates, the secular age sees the church as an agent of evil. Never mind that the church actually provides the moral law by which evil is intelligible, and we will just skip over the fact that hundreds of millions have been slaughtered at the hands of modern warfare, concentration camps, killing fields, forced starvations, and abortuaries, all in the name of an enlightened secular state divorced from the church. To me, the central apologetic for the church today is to contribute to a sacred social order, where churches, families, Christian schools and free-market industries mutually reinforce one another in a society founded on virtue and grace, the very order that characterized Christian societies for 1,500 years. Let the public schools rot, as you so pointedly observed would happen if Christians finally got serious about a sacred social order.

Steve Turley

A number of years ago, I worked with a man who, to put it kindly, had the filthiest mouth imaginable, and his was truly a case study. Never seen anything like it before or sense.

It became quite obvious that he was so seeped in profanity, so saturated with it, that often, he did not even realize it when he did it. I can remember one time, when someone demanded that he tell a "clean" joke if he was going to tell one, and he said "OK, how about this one...." only to open a sewer.

Now, I mention that only to say that from the two posts by YOU that I just read, that YOU seem to be so seeped in anti Christianity that you do it even when you are explaining why you are not doing it.

I would hope that would be of concern for someone in your profession of "objectivity," maybe even alarming.

BTW:

I knew an elderly lady once, who told her grand kid who came out with a choice word "You just had in your mouth something I wouldn't want on my hands."

Tis even more true when its in the heart.

God bless

Dear Sapient,

All I can say is that your name is ironic.

Today it just boils down to the fact that liberals find it so distasteful to think that all rights come from God and not government.

Mr. Turley, Thank you for your response. It appears that we agree on several ideas in your posts.

Institution of a Sacred Social Order....

You may be using a straw man argument here, because no one I know wants a sacred social order. That is not what this is about. This is about the freedom for individuals to promote the superiority of the Gospel in the marketplace of ideas, and the freedom for people to choose their own destiny (for lack of a better word.) Every time, secualism and socialism will fail without massive Governmental support; then the Government runs out of other people's money, and the Nation falls.

The 'tectonic shift" to which you refer has only happened because of the promotion of leftist, secular ideas in place of the Gospel. The Founders intended for Christianity to be respected and encouraged; this is evedenced by the writings of their era, as they are replete with references to the Gospel. And because of Christianity, and only because of Christianity, people have been free to practice other religions here (try practicing another religion in an Islamic country!) Yes, the Church is partially complicit in this shift as well, because some of the leaders accepted the ideas of fallen man as superior to the Word of God; this is demonstrated in the acceptance of the evolutionary fairy tale* by some in both the Church and the scientific communities. Evolution has lead to the imaginary de-thronement of God, and thus the acceptance of the idea that an unborn child is merely a "blob of tissue" (or a worse description) and not a person. Without God, the Devil's Golden Rule applies: "He who has the Gold, makes the Rules."

The comment you included with your post is evidence of the replacement of the Truth with secularism, as you say. It appears, however, that he/she may be deliberately choosing to ignore the evident brutality of every culture, past or present, where the Truth of the Gospel has not been preached or has been suppressed. The brutalities of secularists in the last 100+ years alone far outnumber those done by false Christians in the name of Christ. Ancient civilizations, without exception, were extremely barbarous; indeed, cruelty was the order of the day. Every nation where the Gospel has been proclaimed and accepted, has seen an increase in personal liberty, and generally an increase of personal and national prosperity. This is all borne out in History. Conversely, the decline in America increases as the Gospel is increasingly suppressed.

*It is interesting to note that now, more and more scientists are finally admitting that evolution is false. A fossil, you see, can only tell you (or anyone) two things:

1.) it was at one time alive, and 2.) it is now dead. It cannot even tell you how old it is. Radiometric and radio-carbon dating have many, many problems, and remain ineffective in resolving the date issue.

The evidence for evolution and for creation is actually the very same. What matters is the pre-conceived bias through which the evidence is interpreted. The secular scientific world has decided apriori that the Supernatural does not exist. That leads to the rejection of Biblical Truth. Creationists, on the other hand, view the Bible as the Word of God, and view the evidence from the perspective of the Eyewitness, who has told us what He did, and when He did it. The Almighty God is certainly able to protect His Word from error, although Biblical Inerrancy only applies to the original manuscripts. However, the consistancy of the other ancient manuscripts (copies, and copies of copies, etc.)shows that we have approximately 99.99% accuracy among all of them, the only differences being copiest errors, and alternate spellings. No major doctrine is in any way affected.