Of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Today's "Liberal" Causes

In a recent article, Professor Peter Dreier appropriated Martin Luther King Jr. as champion of the “liberal” side of several raging public debates. Having been inspired from childhood by the justice of King’s struggle for racial equality and the effective and eloquent way in which he pursued his “Dream,” I find Dreier’s conclusions surprising and counter-intuitive. I reject the assumption that this giant of a man can be so neatly categorized.

Dreier claimed, for instance, that “King would stand — and sit in when necessary — with the LGBT community to help push states toward legalizing same-sex marriage…” The staggering presumptuousness of such a statement is exposed by the preceding sentences, in which Dreier first concedes that “King did not approve of homosexuality,” but then declares that King’s viewpoint would certainly have changed over time in light of the NAACP’s position and growing support for gay rights among black clergy members.

First of all, it is the height of arrogance for anyone to start from King’s known, stated position (disapproval of homosexuality), and assume that he knows King’s psyche, religious convictions and motivations well enough to conclude that King would have done an about face as a result of special interest groups or polling data.

But beyond that, the rationale behind Dreier’s conclusion is unconvincing. Historical giants like King are historical giants precisely because they don’t form their moral views based on cultural trends; rather, they resist man-made constructs that ultimately harm and degrade human beings and lead us, instead, to what is true, good, and beautiful.

William Wilberforce stood against the slave trade and Dietrich Bonhoeffer against the Nazis because, like King, Wilberforce and Bonhoeffer believed that every human being is created in the image of God and therefore has unique dignity and inherent worth. There is no escaping it: at the core of these heroes of humanity is a decidedly and specifically biblical worldview. Their passion for honoring the teachings of Jesus Christ was their motivation for waging war against various iterations of human oppression.

Where would King have stood on gay marriage? I don’t presume to know the answer. Although the Bible consistently identifies homosexual activity as a moral wrong, many today profess to be convinced that Jesus Christ himself would have championed gay marriage as a step toward love, compassion and equality.

My respect for King is deep enough, however, to convince me that he would have studied the Scriptures to critically evaluate that claim. In considering whether recognition of gay marriage really is loving and compassionate, he probably would have examined the reasons for marriage and the likely societal consequences of defining this fundamental institution based on individual preferences. He would have looked past value-laden labels and studied the contents of the package under a lens comprised of both compassion and truth.

Another label King would have parsed is that of “reproductive freedom.” Dreier trots out the fact that King once received a “Margaret Sanger Award” as ironclad proof that he would have been an abortion rights activist. Dreier candidly admits, however, that “King never spoke publicly about his views on abortion,” and that he was assassinated before Roe v. Wade was decided.

We live in a culture committed to the concept of liberty and obsessed with the idea of “choice,” so any conduct packaged in the trappings of “right to choose” (as any conduct at all might well be packaged) appears, superficially, to be a moral good. But I believe King would have balked at the idea of labeling one human being’s purposeful destruction of another human being as a liberty or “choice” that is beyond the power of a civilized society to restrict.

While supportive of Planned Parenthood’s educational efforts on birth control, I think King would have wept at the rate at which babies of color —babies with unique dignity and inherent worth — are being aborted. I think he would have been outraged that a whopping 80 percent of Planned Parenthood clinics are strategically located in minority neighborhoods.

It is impossible for anyone to credibly claim King’s endorsement for causes that arose after his death. But this much we know: King was a follower of Jesus Christ.

His boldness, compassion and commitment to serving others were beautifully consistent with the Christ depicted in the Bible. And just as Christ stood for timeless moral absolutes, I believe King would have looked beyond labels, politics, and polls and stood for transcendent truth, goodness and beauty.

Bradley Manning and Hormone Therapy: Two Formulas of Ideas.

Bradley Manning, sentenced to 35 years at Fort Leavenworth for leaking military secrets, would prefer to live out his prison sentence as a woman called "Chelsea." A bevy of high-profile organizations (including the ACLU, the Human Rights Campaign, and other gay and lesbian activist groups) insist that failure of the Army (funded by taxpayers' hard-earned dollars) to make this dream come true amounts to a deprivation of human rights. You can read the news story here.

To anyone asking how we, as a society, have arrived at the place where such a demand can be "reasonably" made by a convict, I offer the following logical (?) formula of ideas:

A person's desire to be the opposite gender from that which he or she is physiologically is a type of illness (“gender-identity disorder”).

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Gender-identity disorder can be treated by hormone therapy that allows the patient to develop physical characteristics of the gender he or she desires to be or believes he or she should be.

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It is “cruel and unusual punishment” for the government to refuse to fund drug therapies for prisoners that may cure or reduce the severity of their illnesses.

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Bradley Manning should receive hormone therapy during his prison term, and we (the taxpayers) should pay for it.

But consider this alternative formula of ideas:

A person's desire to be the opposite gender from that which he or she is physiologically is a type of illness (“gender-identity disorder”).

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While it is possible to use drugs to change a person's physiological make-up to that resembling the opposite gender, such “treatment” is simply a way of indulging the person's desires, which have already been identified as a disorder.

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It is not the responsibility of government to use taxpayers’ money to indulge desires of prisoners that are manifestations of mental illness—nor would doing so be in the prisoners’ ultimate best interests.

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Bradley Manning's disorder should be treated with the same counseling and mental health services that are available to all other prisoners, and taxpayers should not pay for him to receive hormone therapy.

Would "human rights" organizations insist that prisoners who suffer from eating disorders be provided with taxpayer-funded liposuction? And if so, would they really be serving the best interests of those who are suffering?

A Nation of Liberty or A Nation of Feelings?

Judicial doctrines built upon contemporary America's unhealthy focus on feelings have left fundamental freedoms at risk.

Virginia Christian Alliance (VCA) has filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the United States Supreme Court in the hotly contested public prayer case of Town of Greece v. Galloway.  We are asking the High Court to reevaluate its current, perception-based framework for deciding cases involving religious speech or symbols in public settings and to return to a historically correct interpretation of the Establishment Clause to prohibit only government policies involving religious coercion.

The case arose out of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which held that the Town of Greece, New York, had created an unconstitutional "establishment" of religion by allowing local clergy members to offer invocations at Town meetings on a voluntary, non-discriminatory basis.  The Court held that this policy violated the Establishment Clause because, in fact, most of the clergy members who volunteered to pray represented the Christian faith.  This was unacceptable, held the federal court, because non-Christians may have felt left out.  Attorneys for Alliance Defending Freedom are representing the Town in the appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

If we can trust James Madison’s explanation to the First Congress, the liberty protected by the Establishment Clause is the freedom from being coerced to support or practice religion.  But under the Supreme Court's modern interpretation of the Clause, it prohibits any word or act which a bystander might perceive as a message of government "endorsement" of religion. 

In our brief, we argue that this reading is entirely at odds with America’s unmistakably religious heritage and the actual practices of those who drafted, debated, and adopted the First Amendment.  In fact, an intellectually honest application of the Court's modern Establishment Clause doctrine would result in the invalidation of countless national traditions, including the Pledge of Allegiance, Presidential Thanksgiving Proclamations, Supreme Court opening statements, the National Day of Prayer, and the national motto, “In God We Trust,” which is inscribed upon various government buildings and currency.  

While the Supreme Court's decision in this case is poised to be a landmark ruling on the practice of public invocations, the impact of this case may actually reach much further than the issue of public prayer. 

The case is a perfect example of the impact our culture’s obsession with feelings has had on judicial doctrine.  Emotions--subjective, unknowable, and transitory as they may be—are now a determining factor in constitutional analysis.  Consider, for instance, the following quote which the Second Circuit offered as its rationale for striking down the Town's perfectly neutral invocation policy (which, remember, involves prayers offered by private citizens):  "People with the best of intentions may be tempted, in giving a legislative prayer, to convey their views of religious truth, and thereby run the risk of making others feel like outsiders."

This basis for constitutional decision-making should give pause to the student of American history.  Is this the nation of freedom birthed through the labors of men like George Washington, John Adams, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson?  Were these men, who risked being hanged as traitors for their efforts, really concerned with securing the psychological well-being of their fellow man by ensuring that no person would ever be permitted to express in a government setting an idea that might offend another person? 

No.  Their work, and their legacy, was about securing liberty.  And liberty finds no refuge in a jurisprudence of feelings.

Freedom-loving Americans should hope that the Court will use this case to reject the idea that my liberty is endangered when I don't like the ideas you express through spoken words.  Your words pose no threat to my liberty, but the judiciary has begun to allow my feelings about those words to demolish your liberty.

In their genius, our Founding Fathers did not leave offended separationist citizens without remedy for their hurt feelings.  Those who feel offended by references to faith in the public square can certainly vent their policy views at election time.  But when the judiciary indulges litigants' desires to gag religious citizens or public officials and to force religion into the private recesses of society, it is giving them a court-enforced heckler's veto over the liberty of others. 

It is the hope of VCA and the organizations and legislators who joined us in this brief that the High Court will seize upon this opportunity to serve the interest of liberty by rejecting a jurisprudence of feelings.

We would like to thank the following organizations and legislators for joining the brief:

• Concerned Women for America
• The Congressional Prayer Caucus Foundation
• The Frederick Douglass Foundation of Virginia
• The Valley Family Forum
• Fredericksburg Rappahannock Evangelical Alliance
• The Black Robe Regiment of Virginia
• Delegate Richard "Dickie" Bell
• Senator Dick Black
• Delegate Ben Cline
• Delegate Todd Gilbert
• Senator Emmett Hanger
• Delegate Steve Landes
• Delegate Bob Marshall
• Senator Steve Martin

 To read the brief in its entirety, click here. 

Sorting Out the DOMA Decision

Even though my family was on vacation in Wyoming last week, I didn't escape the brouhaha over the Supreme Court's same-sex marriage decisions.  (The ecstasy and the agony of a smartphone!) Because this issue is so emotionally charged, however, I opted to wait until I was comfortably at home again--and able to read the Court opinions for myself--before entering into any discussion about them.

Having read United States v. Windsor, the decision dealing with the constitutionality of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), here are some of my thoughts...

1.  Justice Kennedy, writing for the majority, both misunderstands and insults a widely embraced worldview (which I happen to share) when he concludes that Congress' recognition of marriage as being exclusively a  union of one man and one woman is necessarily based upon animus against homosexual individuals. 

There are myriad justifications for the decision of a majority of the nation's federal legislators (which, by the way, was ratified by a Democratic executive) to reserve special governmental benefits for a certain type of familial arrangement.  The most obvious, of course, is the deeply rooted, historically tested belief that children are most likely to thrive when raised in a stable relationship with a mother and father.

Assuming a connection between the desire to protect traditional marriage and an "animus" toward homosexual individuals or couples is simply assuming too much.  The two ideas are certainly not linked as a matter of logic.

2.  In a nation where the federal government is rapidly taking over every aspect of our lives, the Court was right to emphasize principles of federalism.  The majority's decision relied heavily on the power of States to define and regulate marriage.  It did NOT rule that homosexual couples have any constitutional right to be married, per se, but rather that the federal government had denied legally married homosexual couples the right of equal protection by refusing to recognize their state-approved union.

However strenuously I may disagree with that legal conclusion (because of its faulty premise, a questionable equal protection analysis, and the failure to recognize the federal government's right to define terms for its own programs), I wholeheartedly agree that when it comes to marriage and family, States should be taking the lead in making policy. 

It may be tempting for conservatives to think that with an issue this fundamental and this important, the federal government should have the final say.  My response to that, however, is three little words:  Roe versus Wade.

Beyond the obvious deficiencies in the logic and analysis of that fateful decision, the real tragedy of Roe v. Wade was that by constitutionalizing the issue of abortion (and by doing so in the most counterintuitive way), the Court, in a sense, withdrew it from the political process.  The Court threw the game, putting the ball on the abortion proponents' side and leaving the pro-life team to defend a precious few yards of ground with our hands tied behind our backs.

In short, I believe that the majority's decision on DOMA is significantly flawed.  But at least it leaves proponents of traditional marriage to gain what ground we can through the merits of our position, the winsomeness of our tone, and the examples we set in our own families.

Can the Boy Scouts Yet Remain "Morally Straight"? (published in the Roanoke Times today)

I was slightly less disturbed by the Boy Scouts of America's new membership policy after reading it in the context of its preamble.  While the new policy specifies that no youth may be denied membership because of sexual orientation or preference alone, the preamble insists that: "Scouting is a youth program, and any sexual conduct, whether homosexual or heterosexual, by youth of Scouting age is contrary to the virtues of Scouting."

Bingo.  These are, after all, children, whose "sexual orientation" and "sexual preference" we are expounding, and BSA is right to recognize that any sexual conduct by youth is unacceptable.

The thoughtful observer is left, then, to wonder:  what is the purpose of the policy change?

If it is meant to ensure that no boy is excluded from scouting simply because he is less masculine in appearance, gait, voice, or athletic acumen than the average Tom, Dick, or Harry, then it is a good thing.  No one should be excluded on the basis of innate characteristics over which he has no control.  That is a form of discrimination which is mean-spirited and unjust, and it is right for BSA to prohibit it.

I am encouraged by the statements on BSA's website recognizing this critical distinction between identity and actions.  In other words, a boy who may allegedly feel "attracted" to other boys can still be a scout, but a boy who acts on that attraction (or on opposite-sex attraction, for that matter) by engaging in sexual conduct cannot.

This is a noble and appropriate position in that it manifests compassion for kids while preserving moral integrity.  Each of us struggles with our own temptations, yet hopes to find grace and acceptance as we struggle.  It is when we yield to our temptations and embrace them as our intended way of life that love demands the toughness of a hard line.  There are few aspects of one's identity, nature or feelings that can be controlled, but actions surely can and should be restrained and guided by moral instruction.

What continues to gnaw at me, however, is the awareness that a society bent on erasing the idea of “wrong” will not be sated by this kind of position.  For instance, the public discussion about the need for acceptance of boys who are “openly gay” suggests that “tolerance” requires scout leaders to yield the floor to boys who choose to discuss their sexual urges openly (or at least if those urges are same-sex in nature). 

This would be at odds with the BSA’s explicit statements that it does not intend to permit the sexualization of scouting.  If BSA’s policy is interpreted by leaders to obliterate the value of sexual purity—which, at this age, means chastity--then this noble organization will lose valuable acreage of moral high ground that benefits all boys, whatever their feelings or inclinations. 

The policy is also troubling because any effort to suggest to (or teach?) scouts that homosexual activity is a "morally straight" option creates an irreconcilable conflict for many with the fulfillment of the scout oath to do one's "duty to God."  The God of the Bible has condemned the practice of homosexuality in no uncertain terms, and BSA should refuse to attempt the impossible task of reconciling Holy Scripture with the new cultural "norm." 

Such mediation efforts will not produce more enlightened, caring men; they will, if successful, produce men who die of thirst in a desert of moral relativism.  How cruel it would be to insist that scouts be “morally straight” while denying the existence of a plumb line.

C.S. Lewis aptly lamented, "We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise."  My hope is that Boy Scouts of America may yet help men to find their chests.  That doesn't mean tolerating the bullying or exclusion of boys who are different or struggling.  It does mean holding fast to the distinction between accepting people and approving of their behavior. 

 

The Courts, Prayer, and People's Hurt Feelings

You may have heard by now that the United States Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case involving invocations at town meetings.  The case, Town of Greece v. Galloway, arises out of a New York town where officials tried hard to do everything right. 

Under the Town's neutral policy, clergy from various places of worship listed in town publications were invited to offer invocations at the monthly public meetings.  Citizens could also volunteer to offer prayers, and no volunteer (including a Buddhist and a member of the Baha'i faith) was ever refused the opportunity.

So what was the problem with that, you ask?  According to the Second Circuit, there simply weren't enough prayer-givers from minority religions to make the invocation practice acceptable.  This produced the unconscionable result that must, at all costs, be avoided:  the potential for someone in the crowd to "feel" like an "outsider" because the majority of the prayers sounded Christian. 

The appellate court's decision is troubling on many levels.  But most troubling to me, by far, is the idea of a First Amendment that prohibits speech on the basis of how others may feel about it. 

Today I have begun drafting an amicus (friend of the court) brief to the United States Supreme Court on behalf of Virginia Christian Alliance and a number of state legislators.  Our goal is to talk the Court down from the ledge of its modern Establishment Clause jurisprudence, reminding them that the whole point of the First Amendment was to not only protect, but to encourage the kind of robust, full-throated debate that is meaningful enough to cause hurt feelings, but important enough to be worth it.

A Tilted Gospel

If you follow my blog, you know that quite a controversy has been stirred up in Harrisonburg about the opening of "The Tilted Kilt" here in town.  A couple of weeks ago, following on the heels of two separate Op-Eds raising a variety of concerns about the business, an ad appeared on the back page of the newspaper.  It stated:

The River Church WELCOMES THE TILTED KILT TO HARRISONBURG.  We know that The Tilted Kilt has come under some fire from people who claim to speak on behalf of people of faith, but we at The River Church want to stand firm in support of business and job growth in our community.  While some may pray that the restaurant fail, we believe prayer is best suited to matters of love, hope, healing and peace.  ...  If you are interested in a church where love and tolerance reigns as it did for Jesus, check us out!  All our [sic] welcome!

Now first of all, just to be clear on the facts, my Op-Ed did not mention the word "pray" or "prayer."  It did not, in fact, even mention Jesus or Christianity, but focused on the various types of harms that businesses like TK pose to various members of the community and their relationships. 

But the clear implication of The River Church's advertisement is that my condemnation of the TK business model (exploiting women's bodies for profit, appealing to men's sexual appetite, damaging relationships) is directly at odds with the "love and tolerance" of Jesus.  Unfortunately, this isn't a novel idea, but one that plagues the Body of Christ at every turn.  Many Christians and churches have been cowed into silent retreat from the moral debates raging in our society by this stinging accusation that our rejection of certain systems, laws, lifestyles or ideas as "wrong" is a message of judgment and therefore unloving and not Christ-like.

To be sure, Jesus was loving, and He welcomed even the most notorious of sinners to His side.  But He never shrugged His shoulders at their sin.  His message to the woman caught in adultery was not, "Go, your sin doesn't matter."  It was, "Go, and sin no more."  He knew all along that her sin, and mine, would cost His life.

The idea of "tough love" sounds trite, but real love is tough.  In fact, it is impossible for one to really love another while condoning the other's sin, because all of God's laws have been given to us for our good.  And certainly love does not affirm sin as a virtue!  A Christian welcoming a business built upon lust into her community is like a mother welcoming a sexual predator into her daughter's bedroom.

How can we, having been rescued from the hopeless existence of a life apart from God, remain silent as friends and neighbors gorge themselves on the counterfeit pleasures of a darkened world?  How can we, having been rescued from the quicksand of our sin, tell others who are sinking that they are on solid ground?

When I attended Elkton Pride Day some time ago, I had a long conversation with a Unitarian Universalist minister.  I was seeking to understand how he reconciled his views on homosexuality with the Bible.  At one point I asked him, "How do you believe people can be saved?"  He responded that basically, we just do the best we can to be good.  Our conversation came to an end then, as I simply explained that this was a message of condemnation to me, because I know that I am not good.  Even the "good" that I try to do is tainted by sinful motives and pride.

And this, essentially is my point.  The message of "I'm o.k., you're o.k.," is candy-coated poison.  I'm not o.k., and you're not o.k., and that is why Jesus was tortured and killed.  But because He took our punishment, there is hope for us, and something so much more, so much better, than the rubbish this world is peddling.

    I know a place, a wonderful place
    Where accused and condemned
    Find mercy and grace
    Where the wrongs we have done
    And the wrongs done to us
    Were nailed there with Him
    There on the cross.

          -Vineyard