Nearly every branch of government in the US is controlled by Christians, there are no national holidays for any religion besides Christianity. There has not been an openly Jewish, Muslim, Taoist, Bhuddist, Wiccan, Athiest or Hindu President of the United States, and all have participated in primarily Christian religious activities when in office.
Why then are vocal American Christian leaders pretending that they are "under assault" all the time? Isn't this point of view totally disrespectful of people who have REALLY suffered oppression in this counrty, or is it OK to compare the struggle of Christians in America to African-americans struggle for racial equality or Anti-Semitism?
PS: Happy Holidays. Are you talking about Cristians or churchians? Are you refering to people who go to church or people who have become born-again? I'm a born again christian and I've experienced predudice on this point more than once. I've heard people ridicule my religion as being a bunch of bloodthirsty, power hungry, hypocrites as they continue to refer to things like the spanish inquisition and the witch hunts as evidence of this conjecture while failing to acknowledge that it was the catholic church that carried these out and not the modern born-agains. No christian today was alive back then and no one today was responsable. All the people who instituted those things are now dead, yet people who make a religious choice are being held responsable, at least coloquially and are being seen as a monstourous and demonized collective rather than as individuals who deserve fair treatment.
Have you ever been told to shut the f**k up for defending something you believe in after it was being venemously attacked by your peers? Have you ever been told that mentioning something you believe in is politically incorrect? Have you had to watch the central figure of your religious holidays be ripped out of the context of them? Christmas and Easter are christian holidays and mention of the one that they honor, Jesus, is considered politically incorrect. Have you ever gotten a dirty look for what you are?
Yes, many people in congress and the presidents are christian, however it seems that you choose to see this fact over the fact that they are individuals attempting to run a country. As far as other racial battles, perhaps it's not that bad yet, but it can get that bad. No racial or cultural preduduce ever happens all at once. It usually takes time to build up. However, if someone were to be sitting at a coffee shop and express loudly that s/he hated black people, they'd get stomped for being a bigot. Take that same situation and have that person loudly expressing their hate for christians and you have people joining in. It's not only seen as ok, but it's often approved of even though it's still bigotry. Generalizing and entire group of people under one label and perpetuatig a demonized steriotype for that group is always the same thing, no matter who you do it to. I'm a Christian. I don't believe that we are under assault all the time. I do know that this country was founded on Biblical principles, but the government should not force any religion on anyone.
it is not ok to compare the struggle of Christians in America with the struggle for racial equality. I don't think we are suffering.
I'm just here to say that not all Christians are saying that. One thing that bothers me is that so many people claim to be Christians who aren't. They are making us look bad.
I'll tell you what I am. I'm a Baptist. That makes me different than all the other so-called Christians out there. This is not a question - This is a rant
You know the answer
Every majority community in every place in the world magnifies the threat from its largest minority and opresses all minorities - It often shifts focus to opress other minorities so that it doesn't look like a witch-hunt of the members of the largest minority.
This is in most ways tied to nature's predisposition to reward those who propagate (often at the expense of others). But all that is natural is not necessarily desirable.
The correct thing to do is to integrate oneself better with the majority community - The silent moderates from the majority will speak up for you should such a time come. At all other times they will treat you just as they treat their friends (independent of your minority status)
If your enemies are the politicians - make the people your friends
P.S. Happy Holidays People's perceptions are valid experiences for them.
Perhaps what is involved here is a "category error",
of the kind we see when people say the NAZI state murdered 6 to 8 million Jews. It is not a matter that the killers misplaced 2 million records or nobody knows:
what is meant is that they definitely killed 8 million people as Jews, but 2 million of the victims didn't think they were Jews.
So the Christians - as they perceive themselves - may be different from the "Cultural Christian" as identified by others, meaning a default someone who isn't openly Jewish, Muslim, Tao, Bhuddist, Wiccan, Athiest, Hindu, Pagan, or First Nation's Spiritualist. Those professing a relationship with a real, present Christ who tells them to only act out of love and concern for others, do find their experience to be in a minority. How many corporations prefer to support the welfare of their workers over profits of owners, selflessnes over selfishness? How many TV shows show life without violence, drugs, lying, and life within a loving marriage and church as the basis for all acts and happiness?
Christians are not the only ones who see this.
Professing Messianic Jews readily understand, because they too see litle evidence of following of this Jewish rabbi in evidence today, in our popular culture, in our business culture, or in our caretaking for the weak or helpless or poor.
Yet they also find that their practices or understandings cannot be taught or mentioned in many public forums, schools, etc, while the rites of many of the other groups you mentioned are presented as unchallenged exercises. The symbols of Christians, as incorporated through the founding of the country as expressions of their perceptions, are being removed from public sites and seals, and even the words of their holidays are being restricted from commerce. The least speech is not free speech. The real religion of America's public forum seems to be the Secular, to them. They experience being silenced, unseen, and unacknowledged, as if they are being disenfranchised from the shared culture that invents the future.
Is there a reality to match the perception?
Perhaps the media presented perception is wrong.
Perhaps not.
But no person's experience, offered in love and with love, should be excluded from the Town Hall,
nor anyone dissed by its expression.
If this happens, something doesn't add up, so something larger must be true. |
