John R. Houk
© June 21, 2013
We all know or should know that the Obama Administration is spying on ALL Americans AND has singled Conservatives via Obama’s reach through the IRS to harass their Free Speech by either disenfranchising their cause organizations or to create crimes that are not there for the Justice Department to intimidate Conservative individuals.
I just read a post from Bill Warner of Political Islam in which he accuses the Christian Church in America of becoming weak on moral principles. Warner makes a leap by connecting this moral weakness to the power of the IRS to threaten Churches’ 501c3 status. Most Churches in America connect their 501c3 status to their financial viability to operate. According to rules set up by Congress under the misguided concept of Separation of Church and State the IRS is empowered to crack down on any charity, philanthropic venture, religion – LIKE a Christian Church, nonprofit organization that has the purpose of providing an educational agenda – LIKE a Conservative Tea Party, an educate on Islam organization (e.g. showing how Islam is contradictory to the Constitution’s Bill of Rights) and/or even a Left Wing organization dedicated to correcting racist thought patterns, spreading multiculturalism, upholding Marxist principles that Leftists moronically believe will lead to a better society-culture and so forth whatever you can think of AS LONG AS the 501c3 status has nothing to do with a political agenda affecting Federal, State and Local government. Amazingly Left Wing 501c3 organizations that openly support political candidates seem to get a pass.
The thing is - who determines the line between educational and politics that effects the operation of government? Incidentally the operation of government in connection to 501c3 status typically means throwing support behind a political candidate for legislative or executive office on a Federal, State or Local level. That determination is broad and usually more stringent toward Churches during a Dem Party Presidential Administration. Unfortunately it occurs during a GOP Presidential Administration when Leftists complain to their Dem Party Senator or Congressman or they find a Left Wing bureaucrat in the IRS. Again unfortunately there are many Left Wing bureaucrats entrenched at all levels of government that are nearly impossible to fire under Civil Service rules.
Frankly these 501c3 political guidelines are a bunch of malarkey because they impose Free Speech restrictions and Religious Freedom restrictions in the name of a principle NO WHERE found in the U.S. Constitution. The Supreme Court began adding rule of law to the First Amendment on Church/State Separation in the early 1900s. In 1947 in a SLIM decision of 5-4 Justice Hugo Black wrote the opinion that SCOTUS has been following ever since. Black’s Opinion:
"The 'establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment means at least this: Neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church. Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions or prefer one religion over another. Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion. No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance. No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion. Neither a state nor the Federal Government can, openly or secretly, participate in the affairs of any religious organizations or groups and vice versa. In the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between Church and State.'" 330 U.S. 1, 15-16. (Bold Emphasis Added)
I don’t have a law degree but I know how to read. Jefferson had little to do with writing the Constitution or the Bill of Rights directly. Jefferson’s famous phrasing was in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Church in Connecticut that was concerned of that State’s pre-Constitution days of a State Established Church in which the Baptists were excluded but still had to pay taxes to the State Church. Jefferson was merely emphasizing that the First Amendment forbids the Federal government from establishing a State Church which would be tax supported. The Wall of Separation meant that Christian Denominations no longer had to worry about paying taxes to support a State Church because Congress is forbidden to establish a Church Denomination that is tax supported.
Read this well written introduction to the actual letter Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Church:
The Danbury Baptist Association of Connecticut wrote to President Thomas Jefferson on October 7, 1801, to complain about the infringement of their religious liberty by their state legislature: “what religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the State) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights: and these favors we receive at the expense of such degrading acknowledgments, as are inconsistent with the rights of freemen.” The Baptists, of course, acknowledged that “the president of the United States is not the national legislator,” but expressed the wish that his views on religious liberty would “shine and prevail through all these states and all the world.”
In his brief response, President Jefferson sympathized with the Connecticut Baptists in their opposition to the state’s established religion, while expressing his reverence for the First Amendment’s “wall of separation between Church & State” at the federal level. Jefferson was not advancing the modern view that religion must be excluded from the public square. After all, he concludes his letter, written in his official capacity as President, with a brief prayer.
The now well-known expression lay dormant for nearly a century and a half until Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, in the 1947 case Everson v. Board of Education, put forth the novel interpretation that the First Amendment’s establishment clause applied to the states and that any government support or preference for religion amounts to an unconstitutional establishment of religion. In support of his argument for a radical separation of religion and politics, he cited Jefferson’s metaphor: “[t]he First Amendment has erected a wall of separation between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable.”
Jefferson’s actual aim was quite to the contrary. While he, along with James Madison, stoutly opposed established churches as existed in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and other states (while recognizing that, as President, he had to respect them), he was deeply committed to religious liberty. Jefferson’s letter must also be read in context of his declaration in the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom: “Almighty God hath created the mind free….” The “wall of separation” exists to affirm natural rights, including those of faith and religious worship. The “wall” does not imprison the free exercise of religion. Rather, Jefferson sought to prevent the domination of particular sects, making free the religious practices of all. (Bold Emphasis Added; Heritage Foundation – You can read Jefferson’s actual letter after the introduction)
The four Justices that disagreed with the majority opinion penned by Hugo Black were Justices Jackson, Frankfurter, Rutledge and Burton. Everson v Board of Education was about reimbursing parents of Catholic students on the taxpayer dime for transportation to Catholic Schools but not to private schools. For clarity the dissenting Justices agreed with Justice Black’s “…the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect 'a wall of separation between Church and State”. The dissenting Justices were upset that the Majority Opinion viewed taxpayer money for transporting students to Catholic Schools was a public service and not a government affirmation of a religious institution. So if the Majority Opinion viewed using tax money as reimbursement was government support of a religious entity and thus overruled Ewing Township transporting Catholic kids just as Public School kids. The Supreme Court ruling would have been 9-0 and Black’s Jefferson quote would still loom at the end of the opinion and the Supreme Court would have still nullified the Original Intent of the wording of the First Amendment in the Establishment Clause which reads “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” The words simply forbid Congress to establish a national Church. The following words which “or prohibiting the free exercise thereof” would indicate no government meddling in religion but the Religious Freedom to provide a moral influence on government and society at large.
Thanks to the 1947 SCOTUS ex nihilo expanded meaning to words in the First Amendment from words outside of the First Amendment, Leftist Secular Humanists have continuously used the Courts to water down Christian Morality in American Society. ONLY Congress could make the Constitutional call SCOTUS 1947 performed. AND Congress would be limited to specifically using the Amendment process to add words such as “a wall of separation between Church and State”. Constitutionally the Supreme Court only can say legislation is constitutional or unconstitutional. The U.S. Constitution places legislation – whether it be by the Bill or initiating a Constitutional Amendment – under the purview of Congress.
The majority of Christians have failed to stand up and battle Leftists from bleeding Christianity and Biblical Morality out of the United States of America. In this manner Bill Warner is correct. In Christian America Christians attend the Church of the Poodle. American Christians might want to begin looking for the brave and saving Church of the St. Bernard.
JRH 6/21/13
*********************************
The Church of the Poodle
By Bill Warner
June 17, 2013
It appears that the Obama administration is spying on churches and using the IRS to punish churches about their 501c3 tax exempt status (H/T AtlasShrugs). According to the article, the Obama administration has a program of snooping on the activity in and by churches. The collected church intelligence deals with members who are with Tea Party or who speak publically about guns. (Remember: "cling to their guns and Bibles".) Some ministers believe that agents may have joined churches to spy.
As bizarre as this may seem, it dovetails with other known Obama administration views. Homeland Security has a profile (yes, all law enforcement uses profiling) of the pro-life, pro-gun, pro-Constitution and pro-Bible white Christian as being a potential terrorist.
We do know that the IRS has targeted conservatives, pro-Israel, pro-life, Tea Party and even Billy Graham. When the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association backed the North Carolina ballot initiative about gay marriage, it was notified by the IRS that its tax exempt status was going to be revoked. In the end it was not revoked, but the threat cost money, time and hassle.
All of this has the desired effect of chilling free speech in the churches.
Here is the point: there is no outcry from the churches! This lack of outrage is a measure of the health of Christianity in America-so weak that it cannot even protest the abuse. But, we already knew how morally weak the church is in its response to rape, theft, enslavement and murder of Christians throughout the Islamic world. Christians are the most persecuted demographic group in the world. Over 100,000 thousand Christians died last year, and the response of the churches is to smile and hold a dialog with Muslims who are brothers with the jihadist persecutors. Dhimmi ministers speak of loving their Muslim neighbors, but show no concern for dead Christians. The day of a minister having a Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other is over. The new gospel is: What, me worry?
Why does the moral and spiritual decay of the church matter to a counter-jihadist? This is a civilizational war and our spiritual flank is unprotected. Instead of the church being a guard dog, it is a poodle. Ministers cannot even protect their own flocks, much less the nation. Back in the past the church was the foundation of the nation and a guardian of our society. But now the church won't even bark at an enemy-foreign or domestic. All the church wants is a scratch behind the ears by the intruder. (In fairness, only 95% of the churches are being condemned here.) To be complete, the synagogues are a swamp of ignorance and cowardliness, as well.
So, to the counter-jihadist the church is at best a dead weight of massive ignorance and is frequently found in bridge-building dialogues with the enemy-Islam.
_____________________
Find the Church of the St. Bernard
John R. Houk
© June 21, 2013
____________________
The Church of the Poodle
Bill Warner, Director, Center for the Study of Political Islam
Permalink: http://www.politicalislam.com/blog/the-church-of-the-poodle/
Permalink: http://www.politicalislam.com/blog/the-church-of-the-poodle/
copyright (c) CBSX, LLC, politicalislam.com
© 2007-2013 Political Islam
Use as needed, just give credit and do not edit.
Use as needed, just give credit and do not edit.
No comments:
Post a Comment