Topic Tuesday #155 2015/07/07 "Run up the flag pole"

Flags have been in the news quite a bit lately. You can't peruse the news without stumbling over a veritable plethora of people weighing in on South Carolina and the Confederate Battle Flag. Since that has been covered to death, (TL:DR-The flag still represents slavery and continued oppression, not Southern Pride, deal with it and put the flag in a museum next to the Nazi Party flag from WWII.) I'm not here to talk about the Confederacy or racism or the politics behind mandating the flag be mounted at the top of a 30' pole for all time (hopefully changing soon).

No, today it is about a North Carolina Pastor who has decided to show his distaste for the progressive direction the country has taken by flying the Christian Flag (yes it is a thing) above the United States Flag, Old Glory Herself.

The Christian flag flies above the American flag at a NC church (WJZY/screen grab)

This story was brought to me by RawStory, and you can view it's contents here. http://www.rawstory.com/2015/07/anti-gay-nc-pastor-launches-movement-to-fly-christian-flag-above-the-american-flag/

The narrative goes that Pastor Rit Varriale, long-time anti-gay activist of Elizabeth Baptist Church in Shelby, NC is claiming this action as part of his own "God Before Government" group. On Sunday he unveiled that he had the pole installed specifically to run this up and see who saluted.

He has been met with criticism from unexpected sources such as Fox and Friends and even the Baptist Press, who reported, "Varriale is among an increasing number of pastors who believe government is trying to coerce Christians to live in ways that violate Scripture." To editor K. Allan Blume's credit, the The Baptist Press writer was rather good about just reporting and not taking a side. http://www.bpnews.net/45089/pastors-plan-to-raise-the-christian-flag Varriale knows he is against proper defined flag etiquette, something taught in grade school and to every scout I have ever encountered. If you need to see what it is, Wikipedia has an outstanding rundown of the United States Flag Code (Yes, there is such a thing) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Flag_Code

He said "...from a Christian perspective, our flag etiquette is completely improper, ...we should be flying the Christian flag above the American flag." Varriale is an Army veteran as a Ranger and officer with the 82nd Airborne Division and graduate of The Citadel, Campbell University Divinity School, Duke Divinity School and Princeton Theological Seminary. He certainly has his credentials in order and is at least walking the walk and talking the talk.

I have one rebuttal to him - Romans 13: 1-10 (New American Standard Bible Translation)

Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.
Therefore whoever resists authority has opposed the ordinance of God; and they who have opposed will receive condemnation upon themselves.
For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same;
for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.
Therefore it is necessary to be in subjection, not only because of wrath, but also for conscience' sake.
For because of this you also pay taxes, for rulers are servants of God, devoting themselves to this very thing.
Give to everyone what you owe them: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.
Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.
For this, "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET," and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF."
Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

I am for free speech. I am not into nationalism at all and think such is as destructive as religious division. I count this among those that would burn the US flag in protest. I don't have to like it, but I do respect the free speech and holding to your values in spite of how much of a jerk it will make you appear. At the end of the day, the public court of opinion will settle this one out, as is being done with the Confederate flag. It makes me wonder what the opinion would be is the local Mosque decided to do the same with the Islamic flag. Food for thought.

Topic Tuesday #94 2014/05/06 "Equality?"

As I pay attention more and more to the news now that I have a show that talks about it every week, I find some disturbing recurring themes. There is always violence, that has been pretty steady, with the whole, "If it bleeds it leads" mantra of news agencies around the United States. Today in the US, faith based matters dominate. Don't think so? I can see why you may think otherwise, as on the surface they seem to be other issues. Dig a little deeper, and you get to why it is an issue in the first place.

Take marriage equality, or "gay marriage" as an example. Is this a civil rights issue? Most likely. Why in the 21st century would such civil or even human rights be impinged upon? Religion. It's plain and simple. Countless articles and news stories, and the only ones causing a fuss about letting two humans marry each other, are those with a religious stake in the game. They are losing by the way, and I think that's a good thing for humanity. Eventually those that oppose gay marriage and homosexuality will fall to the side, like their predecessors did for slavery and the rights of minorities and supporters of women's suffrage (though equal pay has a ways to go...).

Take abortion, or right to life, or choose life, or any other number of phrases used to get legislation passed... If one looks at the issue from the position of medical science, there is no real question on the issue. It should remain in the hands of those trained to deal with these matters safely... Rather than those that look at it from the position of life beginning at conception or EVEN BEFORE conception in some cases... http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/10/az-abortion-bills-arizona-gestational-age_n_1415715.html Now we can get into how cells divide and what constitues a person, and when the rights of the mother are somehow less than the child she bears... But we don't need to. Really we don't. You can comment if you like and I encourage you to do so, but be very honest with your arguments.

While on abortion, we also have Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood, sueing to avoid having to pay for the contraceptive mandates within the Affordable Health Care Act. They are claiming that their publicly traded companies have a religious preference... When the entire reason to incorporate it to remove liability from an individual and make the company it's own legal entity. Now this legal entity has a religious preference. Funny how we can't imprison a company, or execute it for a crime, or even talk directly to it... Yet it holds, funny enough, the same religious views as its board of directors... So it can claim that based on its religious objection, it can withhold government mandated care from it's employees, effectively pushing their views upon others.

If they open that door wide enough... There are monsters that lurk there. The monsters of other peoples faiths and preferences and then... laws.

Here is the problem... The separation of church and state as inferred by the 1st amendment's establishment clause, no matter how you look at it, is there to prevent religions from hurting the rights of others by playing favorites. It's simple. Person 1 believes X. Person 2 believes Y. If you make a law that is based solely off of belief X you can infringe upon the beliefs of Person 2, because they believe Y, not X. The only way for both X and Y to co-exist peacefully is for there not to be any laws based on beliefs... A separation of law and faith; between church and state. It keep is fair.

Now we had a recent result from the US Supreme court that narrowly sided (5 to 4) that it was permissible to have prayer before civic/government functions. All I can hope, is that the invocations/prayers come in from all faiths, equally. History tells us this won't happen and that such displays drive wedges in communities because of differing faiths. Bigotry... Faith Based Bigotry is still alive and well. And it needs to stop...