Coram Deo Blog
Archive for politics
20 July 2010 at 8:03 am by Bob Thune · A29, church planting, politics, prayer
A brother in Christ and a partner in ministry, Pastor Rashid Emmanuel, was shot dead in Faisalabad, Pakistan, yesterday, after being exonerated from accusations of blasphemy against the prophet Muhammad.
AP report
BBC report
We are grieving Rashid’s death and praying/hoping for the safety of other Christians in Pakistan. The country is 97% Muslim, and though the government has a good record of protecting religious freedom, some radicals among the population are very hostile to Christians. Sources on the ground are complaining that the blasphemy charges were spurious in the first place. Religious freedom advocates have criticized Pakistan’s blasphemy law for being vague and subject to exploitation by those hostile to Christianity:
Section 295-C: Use of derogatory remarks, etc; in respect of the Holy Prophet. Whoever by words, either spoken or written or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.
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12 August 2009 at 10:51 am by Bob Thune · culture, politics
If you thought the debates over abortion and constitutional interpretation were a hot button within the Christian community, watch out: universal healthcare might be the new fundamentalism.
According to a recent CBS News report, “President Obama this month is turning to the religious community to rally support for the fundamental idea of expanding health care accessibility.” One of the leading voices for the Christian community in this debate is the controversial Jim Wallis, who avers: “Every so often there is an issue that is so clear and compelling, or so alarming and disconcerting, that it really does galvanize the faith community… Inclusive, accessible, affordable health care for all of God’s children is for us a moral issue.”
“The concept of universal, accessible health care resonates deeply with our common values,” said Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. “We see the people who’ve lost their jobs and health insurance… the people who are left out of what is one of the most remarkable health care systems in the world…We cannot sit idly by while we have a system that just doesn’t work for everyone.”
At face value, I think Christians all agree that we want people to be healthy. We want people to have access to health care. In the Garden of Eden, there was no sickness, nor will there be any in the new heavens and the new earth (Rev. 21:4) – so working for God’s will to be done “on earth as it is in heaven” certainly includes healing, wholeness, and health.
But something troubles me about Wallis’ claim that “inclusive, accessible, affordable health care… is a moral issue” for Christians. I think it’s the modifiers “inclusive, accessible, and affordable” – which are all deeply malleable words that seem to say more than I’m comfortable saying. If we’re going for “affordable,” why not free? If “inclusive,” should it include abortion or voluntary sterilization or assisted suicide? True to his bombastic persona, I think Wallis has gone beyond the pale here in saying more than he can biblically substantiate.
Do you agree? Or disagree?
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28 May 2009 at 11:22 am by Bob Thune · culture, politics
Bizarre news out of San Diego this past week… can the county punish you for practicing hospitality?
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16 May 2009 at 12:57 pm by Bob Thune · city renewal, politics
Yesterday the city’s outgoing budget director wrote an opinion piece explaining the city’s budget woes and offering some solutions. I’m interested in what you think about her point of view.
She deserves credit for cutting through the politics and talking straight about some of the tough decisions required to restore fiscal order. On the other hand, she seems to work from an assumption that the city is entitled to raise taxes, because after all, we can’t keep cutting spending forever!
I imagine that being in her role is tough… it’s a delicate balance to honor taxpayers and also keep city employees content. But I am unsatisfied with her answer to the question, “Aren’t Omaha taxes high enough already?” Her response:
The tax rate is one-third lower than it was 20 years ago, and a study by public finance experts at the University of Nebraska at Omaha found that the city’s tax burden is lower than that in our peer cities… Over the past eight years, the budget has grown less than the rate of inflation, and the city has eliminated 13 percent of civilian jobs. The problem is lack of revenues, not spending. Until our financial issues are resolved, it will not be possible to hire additional police officers, lengthen library hours or do the best possible job maintaining our streets, parks, pools and golf courses — all necessary to make Omaha a better place to live.
In other words: “Our taxes are lower than comparable overtaxed cities, and we city bureaucrats can’t do everything we want unless we raise taxes.” (sorry Smitty, I know not every city employee is a bureaucrat, but this is a blog post after all.)
Questions:
- Is lengthening library hours and maintaining public pools really necessary to make Omaha a better place to live? Or, in a time of economic contraction, should we expect the city to have to make some tough (unpopular) choices?
- Today I was rearranging some files and found my property tax bill from when I lived in the city of Austin, Texas, in 1999. The damage: $740. Compare that to my property tax here in Omaha, for a house of the same value and a property of the same size: $3,800. Does anyone want to make the argument that living in Omaha is five times better than living in Austin? [see comment thread for amendments to this data]
Your thoughts? (Ideally from people who live here…)
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18 March 2009 at 12:26 pm by Bob Thune · gospel, politics
The pastor referenced in this NY Times article today is a personal friend and a partner in the Acts 29 Network. Please be praying for this tough situation – a demonstration of gospel hospitality and yet a bold and risky venture by any stretch. The church exists for mission… and sometimes mission is dangerous.
Outrage Greets Child Killer’s Arrival in New Hampshire Town
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9 March 2009 at 8:09 am by Bob Thune · culture, politics
Modernism was a worldview arising out of the Enlightenment which claimed that science and human ingenuity could solve all our problems. We didn’t need God to create a new heavens and a new earth; we’d create it ourselves.
Regardless of what you currently think about the stem-cell debate, the following Reuters article is worth a close read. For all the hullabaloo about postmodernism, this article shows that especially in the scientific community, modernism is alive and well. Additionally, in the “Objections” series last year I said that atheism relies on “borrowed capital;” every unbiblical point of view only exists by borrowing from the biblical worldview. This assertion is proven below.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama will lift his predecessor’s restriction on federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research on Monday and will give the National Institutes of Health four months to come up with new rules on the issue, officials said on Sunday.
Obama will not lay out guidelines himself but will let the NIH decide when it is ethical and legal to pay for embryonic stem cell research, science adviser Dr. Harold Varmus said.
Researchers and advocates have been invited to a White House ceremony at which Obama will make the announcement, said Melody Barnes, director of Obama’s domestic policy council. He will also sign a pledge to “restore scientific integrity in governmental decision making,” Barnes said.
Former President George W. Bush was accused by scientists and politicians of injecting politics and sometimes religion into scientific decisions regarding not only stem cells, but climate change policy, energy policy and contraceptive policy.
Barnes said scrapping the restriction on federal funding imposed by Bush would help to create jobs and strengthen national security.
…A law called the Dickey Amendment limits the use of federal money to actually make the powerful stem cells, because they must be taken from human embryos. So federal research money can currently be used only to work with cells that were made using other sources of funds.
“The president, in effect, is allowing federal funding on human embryonic stem cells research to the extent that is allowed by law,” said Varmus, a former NIH director who is also president of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York and an adviser to Obama.
“There will be no explicit attempt to draw up what those guidelines will be,” Varmus added.
Researchers are delighted.
“Hallelujah! This marks the end of a long and repressive chapter in scientific history. It’s the stem cell ‘emancipation proclamation’,” said Dr. Robert LanzaAdvanced Cell Technology in Massachusetts. of
“I really hope this is the end of this political football game,” agreed Michael West, who once headed ACT and Geron Inc and is now chief executive officer of a California-based biotech firm called BioTime.
Stem cells are primitive, long-living cells that are the source of all other cells in the body. When taken from days-old embryos they are virtually immortal and can give rise to all the other cells and tissues in the body.
Supporters say they can transform medicine and have been working to use them to repair severed spinal cords, regenerate brain cells lost in cases of Parkinson’s Disease and restore the tissue destroyed by juvenile diabetes.
Dr. Douglas Melton, co-director of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, noted that the process of getting federal funding itself is time-consuming but said his group will seek the cash alongside its other sources of money.
“The removal of this barrier that has stood in our way for eight years will open important new areas of research, and help in moving the field forward more rapidly,” Melton said.
Observations:
- There is an agreement that we need “rules” to guide the ethical and legal nuances of stem cell research.
- Those “rules” should be made without “injecting religion into scientific decisions.”
- God forbid that any ethical rules should impinge on the Great American Ideals of creating jobs (prosperity), strengthening national security (security), and moving forward rapidly (progress).
- Science holds the key to the blessed life: embryonic stem cells are “virtually immortal” and will “transform medicine.”
Questions:
- What framework should we use to decide on ethical rules? This article disdains a religious grid for such decisions. But is not every grid based on some ultimate criteria?
- What is the basis for the ethical trade-offs in this case? We are opening the door to embryonic stem cell research because such research might repair severed spinal cords, regenerate brain cells, and heal juvenile diabetes. Are we not on our way to arbitrating between various kinds of human life? i.e. if cells from a human embryo can heal a kid with juvenile diabetes, have we not said that the kid with diabetes is more human – or more worth saving – than the embryo?
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23 January 2009 at 9:41 pm by Bob Thune · politics
It’s a sad day for unborn babies around the world as President Obama today chose to reinstate federal funding for international groups that perform abortions, reversing the “Mexico City policy” first enacted under Ronald Reagan.
The most grievous thing about this decision is the political rhetoric that refuses to acknowledge the tragedy of abortion and the humanity of unborn babies. Hilary Clinton lauded Obama’s support of “reproductive health services,” while the head of the UN Population Fund praised Obama’s “leadership in promoting and protecting women’s reproductive health and rights worldwide.”
Whether you consider yourself a fan or a foe of Obama, I would love to hear your thoughts on this action. How do you feel about it?
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10 November 2008 at 8:12 am by Bob Thune · politics, subculture
Came across this article from conservative commentator Cal Thomas this morning… you may not agree with everything in it, but it offers an interesting critique of Christian-subculture politics.
RELIGIOUS RIGHT R.I.P.
By Cal Thomas
Tribune Media Services
When Barack Obama takes the oath of office on Jan. 20, 2009, he will do so in the 30th anniversary year of the founding of the so-called Religious Right. Born in 1979 and midwifed by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell, the Religious Right was a reincarnation of previous religious-social movements that sought moral improvement through legislation and court rulings. Those earlier movements — from abolition (successful) to Prohibition (unsuccessful) — had mixed results.
Social movements that relied mainly on political power to enforce a conservative moral code weren’t anywhere near as successful as those that focused on changing hearts. The four religious revivals, from the First Great Awakening in the 1730s and 1740s to the Fourth Great Awakening in the late 1960s and early ’70s, which touched America and instantly transformed millions of Americans (and American culture as a result), are testimony to that.
Thirty years of trying to use government to stop abortion, preserve opposite-sex marriage, improve television and movie content and transform culture into the conservative Evangelical image has failed. The question now becomes: should conservative Christians redouble their efforts, contributing more millions to radio and TV preachers and activists, or would they be wise to try something else?
I opt for trying something else.
Too many conservative Evangelicals have put too much faith in the power of government to transform culture. The futility inherent in such misplaced faith can be demonstrated by asking these activists a simple question: Does the secular left, when it holds power, persuade conservatives to live by their standards? Of course they do not. Why, then, would conservative Evangelicals expect people who do not share their worldview and view of God to accept their beliefs when they control government?
Too many conservative Evangelicals mistake political power for influence. Politicians who struggle with imposing a moral code on themselves are unlikely to succeed in their attempts to impose it on others. What is the answer, then, for conservative Evangelicals who are rightly concerned about the corrosion of culture, the indifference to the value of human life and the living arrangements of same- and opposite-sex couples?
The answer depends on the response to another question: do conservative Evangelicals want to feel good, or do they want to adopt a strategy that actually produces results? Clearly partisan politics have not achieved their objectives. Do they think they can succeed by committing themselves to 30 more years of the same?
If results are what conservative Evangelicals want, they already have a model. It is contained in the life and commands of Jesus of Nazareth. Suppose millions of conservative Evangelicals engaged in an old and proven type of radical behavior. Suppose they followed the admonition of Jesus to “love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit those in prison and care for widows and orphans,” not as ends, as so many liberals do by using government, but as a means of demonstrating God’s love for the whole person in order that people might seek Him?
Such a strategy could be more “transformational” than electing a new president, even the first president of color. But in order to succeed, such a strategy would not be led by charismatic figures, who would raise lots of money, be interviewed on Sunday talk shows, author books and make gobs of money.
Scripture teaches that God’s power (if that is what conservative Evangelicals want and not their puny attempts at grabbing earthly power) is made perfect in weakness. He speaks of the tiny mustard seed, the seemingly worthless widow’s mite, of taking the last place at the table and the humbling of one’s self, the washing of feet and similar acts and attitudes; the still, small voice. How did conservative Evangelicals miss this and instead settle for a lesser power, which in reality is no power at all? When did they settle for an inferior “kingdom”?
Evangelicals are at a junction. They can take the path that will lead them to more futility and ineffective attempts to reform culture through government, or they can embrace the far more powerful methods outlined by the One they claim to follow. By following His example, they will decrease, but He will increase. They will get no credit, but they will see results. If conservative Evangelicals choose obscurity and seek to glorify God, they will get much of what they hope for, but can never achieve, in and through politics.
(Direct all MAIL for Cal Thomas to: Tribune Media Services, 2225 Kenmore Ave., Suite 114, Buffalo, N.Y. 14207. Readers may also e-mail Cal Thomas at tmseditors@tribune.com.
© 2008 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC
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4 November 2008 at 2:35 pm by Bob Thune · culture, politics
You probably have some idea of who you’re voting for in the presidential race. But seriously: have you thought about the best choice for the Public Service Commission or the MUD Board of Directors? A decent non-partisan voter guide for local Omaha races is put out by the League of Women Voters. It misses some important issues, but at least gives you some insight into the various candidates. Check it out, be informed, and vote.
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19 July 2008 at 11:40 am by Will Walker · politics
If you live in Omaha, you probably heard or read the news story a few weeks ago about a little girl and her mom getting attacked by a pit bull. Well, Charlotte and her mom, Wendy, attend Coram Deo. I spent some time visiting with them last week and they are doing remarkably well, considering. They wish to say thanks to all in our community who have visited, brought meals, etc. Additionally, Wendy would like to inform people about the upcoming legislative discussions concerning pit bulls in Omaha. Open the attachment to read a note from Wendy and to find information on how to take action if you wish to do so.
On behalf of Wendy and Coram Deo, this post is not intended to “push” anything politically, but rather to inform you on how you can get involved, which we encourage you to do.
pit-bull-legislation (click here to see info)
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