Tuesday, October 14, 2014

No intolerance more hateful than the intolerance of the tolerant. . .

From First Things. . . read it all here:

To protect against discrimination, liberals increasingly seek to discriminate. News broke over the weekend that all twenty-three schools within the California State University system have taken steps to “derecognize” InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF), a para-church Christian ministry organization that’s had a longstanding presence within university life religious settings.  What is Intervarsity’s crime? Christian orthodoxy. According to IVCF,
To be fair, these ministries Christians are not banned from campus. They’re simply “derecognized,” which is a bureaucratic way of saying, “You’re Not Welcome.” At Christianity Today, a spokesman for InterVarsity noted what derecognition entails:

Okay, no one is beheading Christians in America nor are they being rounded up and put into camps.  They are not being detained by the police nor are they put on trial for their Christian beliefs.  But if you think that Christianity is under attack only is Islamic countries, you just do not get it.  Christianity is being singled out by the great PC thought police on college campuses like never before.  We won't kick you out for being Christian but we will isolate you, make it hard for you to connect to others who share your beliefs, restrict your access on campus, and make you open to people who not only do not believe but openly challenge your faith.  The truth is that we might be more upset if there were some more obvious form of persecution but one could hardly imagine a form of intolerance more acute than what happens on a typical college campus against orthodox Christianity.  Is it no wonder our kids are going to college and coming home atheists????


The liberals tolerate everything except disagreement with their views.  Sad update to the examples above is the attempt by the Mayor of Houston to intimidate pastors and churches opposing “HERO,” the latest city ordinance that forbids discrimination against homosexuals and a petition to put the whole thing on the ballot for voter approval.  Read the story below:




“Political and social commentary is not a crime,” Holcomb said. “It is protected by the First Amendment.”  The subpoenas are just the latest twist in an ongoing saga over the Houston’s new non-discrimination ordinance. The law, among other things, would allow men to use the ladies room and vice versa. The city council approved the law in June.




Carl Vehse said...

The Liberal Lie: "All beliefs are to be tolerated except those that are not tolerant."

Janis Williams said...

in that case, the Liberals have anathematized themselves.

Anonymous said...

This is just the tip of the iceberg, and if we think this is mild, be assured it will get worse, and they may well end up beheading us?

Anonymous said...

Meanwhile, the Muslim student association will continue to enjoy RSO status.

Gary said...

For almost two millennia, orthodox Christianity has used its influence in society at large to discriminate and harass persons with "liberal", "non-traditional", "agnostic" or atheistic" positions within universities, denying these wicked "sinners" plumb teaching positions, running some out of town, (and at one time, even burning them at the stake.) If you would like examples, I will be happy to post them.

Your chickens have come home to roost, my fundamentalist/orthodox Christian friends. Your reign of tyranny is over. So don't expect too many of us to shed any tears now that you are "persona non-grata".

I will fight vociferously for your right to hold your bigoted, superstitious beliefs and your right to speak them in public. But, I will join with the rest of non-orthodox Christian America in cheering your demise from the seats of power of this great, democratic nation.

Anonymous said...

Hi Pastor,

(1) It is unfortunate what has happened to IVCF groups in these universities.

(2) However, I think your response is overly hostile. Most liberals are not intolerant towards religion, though some are.

(3) Although IVCF is Evangelical, there are both conservative Evangelicals as well as Liberal Evangelicals belonging to these groups, though I suspect that most are conservative.

(4) In the USA, Evangelicals are often perceived to be right wing, pro-war, pro-rich in ways that seem to be incompatible with Jesus of Nazareth as witnessed to in the Gospels.

(5) Many Evangelicals in the USA seem to be anti women's rights, to be on a crusade against the rights of same-sex oriented people and often fail to defend the economic rights of the poor and the oppressed. (This is NOT true of some Evangelicals, but these seem to be less visible to the public eye.)

(6) When the general public (rightly or wrongly) perceives Evangelicals to be bigoted and hostile to some human rights and out of touch with public opinion, what kind of response do you expect from centrist and left of centre social liberals?

(7) Maybe, if IVCF groups showed more compassion, healing-mercy and loving-kindness towards those that they are hostile to, then the way forward towards open dialogue might begin.

(8) If Evangelicals were more warm hearted, open-hearted, tender-hearted in their relationships with others, they might gain the respect of more liberals, then maybe there might be a way forward.

(9) It will take considerable time to change public opinion, but to hold onto intolerant views and to label liberals in the way you have is not going to lead to a way forward.

(10) Any way forward requires genuine repentance(change of mind, heart and direction) by that subset of Evangelical IVCF groups that have shown intolerance, in the past.

John Arthur

Gary said...

God's Gonna Getcha for that, that, and that...but not for Genocide or Ethnic Cleansing

But a man named Ananias, with the consent of his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property; 2 with his wife’s knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds, and brought only a part and laid it at the apostles’ feet. 3 “Ananias,” Peter asked, “why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? 4 While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, were not the proceeds at your disposal? How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You did not lie to us[a] but to God!” 5 Now when Ananias heard these words, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard of it. 6 The young men came and wrapped up his body,[b] then carried him out and buried him.

Millions of human beings have been slaughtered by the disciples of Jesus of Nazareth over the last 2,000 years: pagans, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Indigenous Peoples, and other Christians. During the Crusades the streets of the city of Jerusalem flowed ankle deep with the blood of Muslim and Jewish men, women, and children. Tens of thousands of Jews were periodically and routinely slaughtered in European cities, triggered by the anti-Semitic diatribes of priests and pastors. One third of the population of Germany was wiped out during the Thirty Years War, all in the name of Jesus Christ, from both sides. Millions of Indigenous peoples were brutally forced to convert to the "True Faith" or die horrific deaths by "men of God", the inheritors of the powers of the Office of the Keys, given to them by Jesus himself moments before his Ascension into Heaven.

Now, I have a question for you, Pastor Peters: Just where was the Holy Spirit during this 2,000 year Blood Bath? Why don't we read accounts of entire Christian armies being struck dead on their horses by the Christian God due to their intent to slaughter thousands of non-combatant men, women and children? Why don't we read of officials of the Inquisition being struck down by the Christian God as they attempt to light the kindling at the bottom of a stake to which is bound a terrified Jewish man or woman?

Dear Pastor and fellow orthodox Christians, are you really going to have the gall, the audacity, to once again recite to me the idiotic statement, "God's ways are not our ways"...when your all-mighty, all-powerful, all-knowing God has allowed millions if not billions of human beings to suffer excruciating deaths for nothing more than thought crimes...but...will not hesitate for a second to strike down deader than a door nail, any Christian who holds back on this year's Tithing Pledge???

If there is any proof that your Religion is an invention of men, and not of a god, this is it!

Anonymous said...

Hi Pastor Peters,

(1)Isn't it fair that secular universities have the right to say that only university students should appoint whoever leads their groups?

(2) So if Christian, Buddhist, Islamic, Jewish, atheist, agnostic, and various political clubs and groups exist on secular campuses, why should outside bodies elect who is going to run the group? How is this discrimination? How is this intolerance?

(3) What are IVCF staffers afraid of? Do they think atheists or liberal Christians will join these IVCF groups and lead them away from Evangelical Christianity?

(4) Do they fear that Buddhists, Jews or Muslims might infiltrate these groups and seek to take them over? This seems very unlikely.

(5)How is what has happened persecution of Christians? How is a loss of special privileges for failure to abide by the same rules for all at secular universities, intolerance and discrimination against IVCF? You are way too sensitive Pastor.

(6) IVCF groups are still able to operate at these secular universities and would have these special privileges restored if they were prepared to allow students to select their leaders. Other groups have to abide by these rules, why should IVCF have
special treatment?


John Arthur

Gary said...

I don't think that Pastor Peters and his conservative Christian readers want to hear your rational explanations, John.

They seem to want to sit on the curb and howl "discrimination" and "unfair". They don't want to be reasonable. They want to be mad...RIGHTEOUSLY mad.

Just as a partisan sports fan is not interested in the referee's explanation of why his team has been penalized; the partisan fan only wants to cry "foul" about the call against his team, conservative Christians are not interested in discussing the LONG history of discrimination perpetrated by THEM against others, they only want to wring their hands about their own perceived insults, hurts, and new found minority status.

How pitiful to see the bullies shedding crocodile tears now that they have become the "victims".

David Gray said...


No, it is pathetic to watch a fool revel in his blindness and his aggressive hostility towards the law and its proper administration. Society functions in spite of people like you, not because of people like you.

Gary said...

No, millions of innocent men, women, and children have suffered horrible injustice at the hands of you and yours for the last 2,000 years. Your belief system is the epitome of foolishness: blindly and obediently following the ignorant ravings of Bronze Age, middle-eastern goat herders as you piously discriminate, torture, and slaughter your fellow human beings. And, you are still doing it today. The pogrom against gays in Uganda is just one modern manifestation of the mental depravity that your religion engenders in otherwise sane people. As has been said, Religion causes the Sane to do what only the Insane would come up with on their own.

How lucky we are today to witness your demise.

David Gray said...

"And, you are still doing it today."

How on earth did we overlook you? Must send a memo...

Gary said...


You no more possess a "holy" spirit than does a Medium.

You have just demonstrated the evil that lurks within you once someone has rejected the sugar coated "Jesus loves you" façade that you were taught in Sunday School. Your belief system is no different than that of other ugly, violent, repressive fundamentalist religions on our planet today, only about 400 years less regressed.

Just imagine a world controlled by superstitious, vindictive zealots like yourself. I shudder at the thought of what the victims of your Holy, Inerrant Superstition have endured over the last 2,000 years.