Sunday Weekly Review: Congress Goes to Hell
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[Three days after the show, the Washington Post published an article making the same point. A Religious Protest Largely From the Left: Conservative Christians Say Fighting Cuts in Poverty Programs Is Not a Priority. The article is republished by me in the blog below. Next time you think Focus on the Family or Concerned Women or Family Research Council Jerry Falwell are Christians, think again. Their focus is on hate, not love. They are an insult and an affront to Jesus’ teachings in the New Testament. Kudos to the United Methodist Church, Episcopal Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church USA and United Church of Christ, and Sojourners for recognizing the real spirit of Christmas.]
There’s a special place in Hell for those who mistreat the poor.
As the Republican Congress this week, right before Christmas, through “tax cuts to investors” and “health care cuts to the poor”, grabs billions from the dirt poor to give to the idle rich (while pocketing millions for themselves), what would Jesus do? What would God do?
For Christians in Congress, the act was not just decidedly un-Christian, it was the work of Satan.
[More in Blog]
While Jesus said “the meek shall inherit the earth” and “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than the rich to enter heaven,” the Republicans are determined to punish the meek and to widen the eye of that needle while gorging themselves on the carcasses of the poor like vultures at a trough. They are succeeding. The poverty rate went down every year of Clinton’s presidency and up every year of Dubya’s. As kids go hungry and without toys this Christmas, the Republican Grinches who Stole Christmas ensure that every idle trust-fund heir of a billionaire has not one but two Lear Jets and the rapacious oil companies Sheikhs of the Dubai are the beneficiaries of our tax and petro-dollars.
For the sole Republican Jewish Congressman — we haven’t forgotten you, Eric Cantor of Virginia — your evil act, according to the Hebrew Bible, fiercely angers the Lord God.
“Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and shew mercy and compassions every man to his brother: And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart. But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear. Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the LORD of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the LORD of hosts. Therefore it is come to pass, that as he cried, and they would not hear; so they cried, and I would not hear, saith the LORD of hosts: But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not. Thus the land was desolate after them, that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.”
(Zechariah 7:9-14)
Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, and fair-minded secular humanists and atheists also believe that taking from the poor to give to the rich is an evil, evil act.
And to those that believe that asking the rich to let a few crumbs trickle down from the plate of the idle, trust-fund rich in “charity” to the hard-working poor so they can lap it up like a hungry dog eating scraps…verily, we may well call them hypocrites.
There have always been evil, selfish people. Sodom and Gomorrah were full of them. But the prophets condemned them. As did Jesus and Mohammed.
Where are the preachers tonight as Tiny Tim goes hungry while the Republican (Gin)Grinch Steals Christmas because their hearts are ten sizes too small? Ask yourself who are the Americans who actually support this evil? And how come James Dobson, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and their fellow traveler Rabbis and Imams aren’t condemning, it promising hellfire and brimstone to the sinners?
Could it be that these ministers care more about Expensive Churches and Golden Chalices and High Salaries from the Hypocrites in their Flock who want to call themselves “Christian” or “Jewish” while averting their eyes from the Holy Texts that roundly condemn their cruelty? Care more about Money for their Churches than they do about the Gospels themselves or the Holy Bible?
Wouldn’t Jesus throw these Greedy Money-Hungry Whores from the Temple?
In this Holiday Season, we must do more than throw a few pennies at the feet of a homeless man. We must commit ourselves to throwing out a Congress that seems determined to oppress the poor….
Where are the People of Faith? Do they not see the Evil?
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The ultimate power of peace December 23, 2005 9:52 am
Kronenburger with cheese–and Herod was scouring the countryside–trying to find that baby–not to praise it–but to kill it–he killed many male babies in that course–but couldn’t change the course of destiny–that is for navigators of forces more powerful than earthly kings
Vicky December 23, 2005 5:06 am
I thought of placing this commentary on one of the “Holiday” blogs but after reading the following statement I decided to place it here – thought it ties in pretty well with this topic! It was written by Mark Earley, President of Prison Fellowship.
“Shortly before Jesus went to the Cross, He told His disciples that we will be judged according to how we treated “the least of these, my brethren.”
Here is his commentary in full:
One of the most memorable moments on CBS’s 60 MINUTES had nothing to do with war or political scandals. It was an essay on the meaning of Christmas by the late Harry Reasoner.
Reasoner called Christmas “such a unique idea that most non-Christians accept it and . . . sometimes envy it.” What makes it unique is not the gift giving, but what Reasoner called “the truest thing in the world”: It is the “anniversary of the appearance of the Lord of the Universe in the form of a helpless baby ”
For Reasoner, God chose exactly the correct form needed to intimately identify with us and our condition. And in becoming a helpless child, He made it possible to be loved, as well as feared, since “everyone has seen babies, and most people
like them.”
Fourteen years after his death, Reasoner is still right about the meaning of Christmas, but I’m not sure about most people liking babies, at least the
inconvenient ones. The most obvious example of this diminished regard for babies is abortion-on-demand, which has cost an estimated 40 million babies their lives.
An especially tragic group of these victims are children who have been diagnosed in utero as having Down syndrome. Compared to our slaughter of these innocents, Herod’s efforts to kill the infant Jesus were amateurish: Expectant women are
now pressured into prenatal testing, including amniocentesis; then, if Down syndrome is detected, they are expected to get an abortion, which 90 percent of them do.
And now, according to a $15 million, eight-year study just published last month in the November 10 issue of the NEW ENGLAND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE, science is endeavoring to make these practices easier, at least for women and their doctors. Through a newly developed prenatal test, Down syndrome can now be detected in the first trimester of pregnancy. When one researcher called the outcome of this research “huge,” she was right in ways that probably did not
occur to her: The potential to eliminate a class of people shortly after conception now lies within our grasp.
Of course, we don’t call them “people,” much less “babies.” Instead, we call them “embryos” and, if we absolutely must, “fetuses.” That way, we don’t have to confront the fact that not only are we taking human life, but also that we have
singled out the most vulnerable members of our community.
That singling out makes our Christmas celebrations this year especially ironic
because Reasoner was right: The truest thing in the world is that the Lord of the Universe specifically identified with the poor and vulnerable in His Incarnation. When the Word became flesh, He did not don royal robes, but the
swaddling clothes of peasants and laborers.
In case we missed the point, shortly before Jesus went to the Cross, He told His disciples that we will be judged according to how we treated “the least of these, my brethren.”
Can anyone doubt what grade our society would receive today?
If this sounds a bit somber, recall that the weeks leading up to Christmas,known as Advent, are a time for reflection and repentance. As we prepare to celebrate the Lord’s first coming, we look forward to His second: an appearance
that will forever settle the status of what Jesus called “the least of these.”
Are you ready for Christmas?
Allow Peace December 22, 2005 9:07 pm
Let There Be Peace on Earth and let it begin with me.
Let There Be Peace on Earth, the peace that was meant to be!
With God as our Father, brothers all are we.
Let me walk with my brother in perfect harmony.
Let peace begin with me. Let this be the moment now.
With ev’ry breath I take, let this be my solemn vow;
To take each moment and live each moment in peace eternally!
Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me!
~ Sy Miller & Bill Jackson
Create Peace December 21, 2005 8:06 pm
Be the Change
Peace begins in our lives
when we embody the gifts of the spirit
and return to the love in our heart.
We are the change that will heal the world
as we release atoned thoughts within us.
The ego intellectually grasping spiritual principles
can’t guarantee enlightenment
and epiphanies can’t completely transform;
but, step by step
the path is taken
to a place of infinite possibilities.
Conscience and remorse are meant to lead us
to the love held in trust,
that we only have to arrive at,
to receive.
VLS December 21, 2005 6:31 pm
Peace cannot be manufactured, mandated or legislated.
Peace cannot and will not be found in any organization or in any one or more people.
Peace is a spiritual gift. It is a work of the heart…a work in the heart. It is a spiritual regeneration and renewal in each individual.
Peace can only be initiated by The Prince of Peace, The Creator God.
Until our hearts and minds are renewed by the Spirit, all our efforts to find peace, to create peace, to live peace will be futile efforts.
It is only His work in and through us that will bring true peace…through the Gospel of Peace.
“But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in …Christ. For he is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility.”
~ Ephesians 2:13,14