Response to Alluded Accusation of ‘Hater’

John R. Houk
© November 23, 2009

I received this email from Burr Deming of Fair and Unbalanced (FU to their fans):

At FairAndUnbalanced.com, we devote a day to linking to interesting sites around the web. Yours usually makes the list, although often with a dissenting note.

Tomorrow, Sunday, a more critical than usual piece will appear. I notice that you often offer an analysis of opposing opinions with a direct link to encourage readers to compare for themselves. I hope you will see this as an attempt to follow your own good example.


Best wishes,

Burr

I am actually grateful that I am the subject of someone’s disapproval. It is an indication that fans and foes alike are reading my content.

In either case I will post Deming’s essay followed by my response.

Here is Mr. Deming’s criticism:

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Violent Religious Fanatics

By Burr Deming
11/22/09 12:00:56 am
Fair and Unbalanced

As John Houk at SlantRight explains Islam to Muslims and those who hate them, the message is that Muslims are given instructions to show to all non-Muslims the face of violent intolerance.

Houk's logic is this: there are fanatically fundamentalist Muslims who have turned to violence as an expression of faith. And there are, to be found by diligent search, passages in the Qur’an which can be used to reinforce those actions. Most Muslims are peaceful, according to Houk and those he quotes, but they are merely deluded about the nature of their faith. Radical violent sects know the real faith, as does Houk.

Protests against such conclusions from Christian experts who bring up similar passages from the Christian Bible do not sway him. One example is the 108th Psalm, which offers a prayer for the death of an enemy of the faith and the discarding of his widow and children. That and other such scriptures, to Houk, merely represent occasional anomalies from the main thrust of love and peace. Passages in the Qur’an are to be taken seriously.

So the killing of Dr. George Tiller by an anti-abortion activist is an exception to a peaceful rule, while the killer of military personnel at Fort Hood represents the future of Islam, even if most adherents disagree.

I can dismiss, as a lunatic fringe, death advocates such as Reverend Wiley Drake, who celebrates the killing of Dr. George Tiller. I am a little more concerned about his prayers for the violent death of the President.

Although I do not think they represent most Christians, I am concerned about the growing popularity among conservative radical Christians of Psalms 108, the prayer for violent death of the enemy. Tee-shirts and slogans link the violent passage to the President: "Psalm 109 8 prayer for Obama".

"I would like to be a Christian," a friend once remarked, "but I can't think of anyone I would like assassinated." The spread of violent fantasies directed toward the President and others is not itself shocking. That those violent wishes are accepted, endorsed, and advanced in Fellowship Hall each Sunday is shocking to those seeking to practice a religion of peace.

One concern is the effect of such violent sentiments on a few of the less inhibited among the unhinged. "There is no place for such prayers in any of our faiths," says Rabbi Brad Hirschfield on belief.net "and until we all stand up and say so, at least a little blood will be on all of our hands."

Another friend is sympathetic but remains outside any religious faith. "If there is a God, you have to think she'd support the separation of Church and Hate." As in all things, I'd like to stand with the Lord.

I'm for Separation of Church and Hate. Mr. Houk goes his own way.

- Deming of FU blog
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So once again I have received the accusation of “Hate.”

Thus when Mr. Deming says he is for “Separation of Church and Hate” it is an obvious reference to my Christian and pro-life advocacy. It is also a back-handed (although it be polite) common Leftist accusation of Christian hypocrisy. The typical hypocrisy accusation runs something like this: If Christians are all about peace, love and tolerance why do they ignore violent references in the Bible as well as condemn alternate lifestyles (e.g. homosexuality and transgenderism) and the violence of Islam?

Before I begin a response let me shock (or in the critic’s mind confirm the hypocrisy accusation) the Left and Muslims. I also I am for “Separation of Church and Hate.”

Violence in the Bible when associated with the direction of God is prescribed against unrighteousness, i.e. people full of sin. It is in function with the purpose of securing land for the descendants of the child of promise. The descendants of the child of promise (today known as Jews) were to be an example to teach the world the way of God.

The violence of the Quran by contrast when associated with the direction of Allah is prescribed too violently and humiliatingly to conquer, subjugate, convert or kill all those in the entire world who do not submit to the will of Allah as voiced by Islam’s prophet Mohammed.

The descendants of the child of promise were not exempt from upholding the righteousness of God in the Old Testament version of the Bible. Indeed the non-Jewish/non-Hebrew Assyrians and later the Babylonians were used as an instrument of God to remove the Jews from their land due to forsaking the way of God for the way of the very people the Jews ejected for sin.

Christians have no business rendering evil for evil. If an abortionist murders unborn children, it definitely is NOT a righteous act to murder the abortionist. This is why the New Testament enjoins Christians to pray for those in authority. The implication of praying for those in authority is that punishment in the earthly realm is the province of earthly authorities which exists by the will of God. God judges a human being that will culminate in The Last Judgment when a human spirit’s life is read like a book hopefully through the filter of the Grace and Mercy inherent in the sacrificial Blood of Jesus Christ. Without the Blood of Christ a human is definitely in eternal trouble. Through the filter of Christ a human is under the measure of the Almighty God’s absolute understanding of the actual thoughts behind one’s actions – good or bad. There is no fooling the insight of God with persuasive arguments.

On the other hand it is a Christian’s duty to vocally share the Mind of Christ with others. The Mind of Christ is best discerned in the Word of God. Hence the moniker of Bible believing Christians as opposed to Progressive Christians. Progressive Christians (i.e. Leftist in nature) cherry pick the Scriptures adopting verses that validate humanistic thinking.

Bible believing Christians definitely are not perfect in interpreting Scripture; however there is more agreement than disagreement.

I always find it amazing when a Leftist or Progressive Christian calls one who asserts his Christian Bible faith a hater in criticizing homosexuality or Islam. It is also fascinating that followers of Mohammed’s Islam play the victim and cry hater toward those who know Islam’s history and are aware that Islam’s theo-political dogma has not officially changed since the day of Mohammed. Certainly there are Muslims who have become Westernized to the extent there is an enjoyment of Western Liberty and Freedom. Nonetheless it is doubtful that most of the Muslims who deem themselves moderate would renounce the words that Mohammed expressed as the word of Allah in the Quran or the authoritative traditions of the Hadith or Sira.

In the case of the Leftist and homosexuality: the Leftist uses the term “hater” against the Biblical Christian yet have no problem whatsoever in either maligning Biblical faith as irrelevant. Often times the Left vocally expresses anger against Biblical Christians wishing to express their faith in their community at public functions with the hyperbole of Separation of Church and State. The Separation of Church and State idiocy is merely a Leftist legal maneuver to prevent Christians the free exercise of the religion in public. This makes Christianity the Leftist’s favorite religion to hate. The Leftist propaganda is this: it is ok to promote Progressive (err … Leftist) propaganda in public (e.g. schools, City Councils, et al) but is offensive to Leftists for Christians to do the same. The Leftist cares little if Leftist ideology is offensive to Biblical Christians let alone if it stifles both Christian Free Speech and the free exercise of religion simultaneously. Now that is hypocrisy.

Then there is the odd co-habitation between Leftists and Muslims (also Muslim apologists) who seek the public acceptance of the free practice of Islamic theo-political religion even though the dogma of Islam if it ever becomes the legal standard would require the death of Leftists for insulting Mohammed, Allah and Islam. If you think that is stretch then look at the intolerance that exists in Muslim dominated nations.

In this perspective I am not a hater. Rather I am an advocate of Free Speech and Freedom of Religion. In respect to Islam I am an exposer of a theo-political doctrine (one might even say a cult) that wishes the destruction of American Free Speech and Freedom of Religion.

JRH 11/23/09
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Response to Alluded Accusation of ‘Hater’
John R. Houk
© November 23, 2009
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Violent Religious Fanatics
© 2008 (sic) FairAndUnbalanced.com