Here is Tony Campolo (Kerry voting Christian) accompanying Bill Clinton out of Ron Brown's funeral. Tony advocates socialism at the cost of baby-slaughter and Christian persecution.
Posted on 12/01/2004 6:04:00 PM PST by OklaRancher
I belong to a Methodist Church in a rural area with a small congretion of 30 or so. This past Sunday the Pastor started his sermon by saying how much good the Bush tax cut could have done if it had been used to alleviate poverty.
Here is Tony Campolo (Kerry voting Christian) accompanying Bill Clinton out of Ron Brown's funeral. Tony advocates socialism at the cost of baby-slaughter and Christian persecution.
I think the key in dealing with problems like this if realizing where the church stands on the inerrancy of Scripture. Usually those denominations or branches of denominations which do not hold to the inspiration of Scripture by the Holy Spirit, are the ones who then theink it is okay to interpret things they way they want, rather than the intent of the Author. A greater issue than your pastor souting off without facts on a politiacl issue, is that it might be indicative of how he handles other issues. Spiritual matters are too important to allow to rest on some preacher's opinion.
The inerrancy of Scripture just mans that the Holy Spirit inspired the original authors, and that God got written what He wanted written. The copies we have today are very good, and the studying of the texts shows they are the best attested documents in history.
What this means is, if it really was God Who was speaking, and if we really have what God wants us to know, there is an accountability. He says lying is wrong, so spouting an opinion on politics which is not based on fact, would be a sin to Him. If the pastor twists other areas of Scripture to allow for homosexuality, for abortion, etc., God is not pleased.
Discernment on alot of issues comes from one's understanding of inerrancy. Where do we get truth?
I used to be a UM pastor, and even was an associate to one of the most liberal senior pastors in a liberal conference! My tenure with him was the beginning of my life as a conservative, as I saw his beliefs as bankrupt and dishonest and basically a grab for power.
First of all, pastors are poor economists. You'll see that whenever you see the resolutions passed by your Annual Conference (as well as the governing bodies of most "old line" denominations). Don't expect to actually argue economics with him/her. You begin by telling him/her that you're going to use "Scripture, Reason, Tradition and Experience" in your discussions. Even they you're fighting 4 years of seminary liberal indoctrination.
Second, you might remind the pastor of John Wesley's advice ("Standard Sermons", as I recall) of "Earn all you can, save all you can, that you might give all that you can." I think this is the definitive statement of conservative charity. It doesn't mention "tax all you can that you can send all the welfare checks you can."
Third, John Wesley didn't advocate taxation for the support of the poor. Wesley's ministries, along with those of early Methodists, never turned to the Church of England or the Crown to address the very distressing social and economic problems of the era. Instead they used religious beliefs, along with limited acts of charity, to change the behavior of those in poverty, and thus bring them out of poverty.
In my 43 years on earth, the United Methodist's liberal voices (the ones you hear at Annual and General conferences) have never had a president that they thought was liberal enough. Their idea of social change (unlike Wesley) is to stay in their upscale NYCity headquarters, hang with the United Nations crowd, and demand that governments do something with other people's taxes.
It's impossible to quantify how Bush's tax cuts have impacted the poor. What we know is that this country had the worst stock market crash in history, followed by a war caused by the worst attack on the USA in our history, and we barely had a recession. My opinion is that Bush's tax cuts, along with low interest rates, greatly softened the blow. To the extent that wealthy people were able to resume their charitable acts sooner, the poor most certainly were the beneficiaries.
You beat me to it. Post#3 suggested a hope to "set your pastor straight" but I've never known any pastor to ever be 'set straight' by a parishioner. OTOH, fellow believers may be another story...
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Tony Campolo and Bill Clinton are good buds.
God is not a Southerner, either. We have pretty good Evangelical churches in the North, too.
If your Methodist minister is like mine there are no facts in existence that will ever sway them from there liberal position. I have tried on Kerry, Iraq, Israel, Boy Scouting, etc. After the election I then got to listen to the sermons on grieving and rightwing christian zealots. Back to your question; ask their definition of poverty and expand it to include morals. Good results with it so far. I haven't been excommunicated.
Maybe they never tried. Either make the effort to set the pastor straight, or find a new parish to attend.
Stay away from preachers that use the pulpit for political commentary. Besides, your pastor is a moron. The tax cut improved the economy and the poor are the first to be hurt by economic decline.
Can't hurt to try and change the pastor's views. I agree, if one can't make the effort to get their views known to the pastor, it's time to move on. One of the things the Lord encourages is a dialogue between you and Him. If your pastor can't feel that way, go somewhere where your voice can be heard freely.
"The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes." ~Thomas Paine.
Your pastor is an unmitigated idiot and should be chased out of the parish.
First, he is directly contradicting God's will by advocating that the government should reverse our "Free Will" by forcefull redistributing income to the poverty striken.
By all accounts such charity should come from the Church, voluntarily, from it's members. They would have more money to do so via George Bush's tax cuts, so really, GW has already helped to alleviate poverty in the sense that God would have done so. In doing so, GW is permitting God's children to work to that end via free will as opposed to confiscatory policy of a souless governing force.
It is through this free will that we serve the Lord and in doing so earn our place in heaven.
Your pastor's implication would rob us all of free will, and deprive us from earing that place in heaven, effectively condemning us to damnation in the worst case scenario.
My wife's final words are that your pastor is in no way a real pastor, but a socialist advocating government over God. Government will come to the rescue, and lead all the lost children to the land of milk and honey and limitless entitlements. Whatever his position is, it is in no way based upon biblical teachings. It's a poorly disguised attempt from someone who really doesn't care about what the bible has to say so much as pushing a political position.
So anyway, welcome to FR. I needed to vent, so thanks for introducing me to your pastor...
A agree. Lately I have taken up the sport of pondering the obvious such as the saying, "The Rich get Richer."
People who are good at making, saving and investing money usually stay that way and/or get better at it as they go along. The same goes for those who are not and do not.
I can sum it up this way..............
About 68 cents of every dollar spent by the U.S. government goes to social welfare.
Less than twenty cents goes to Defense.
50% of the people in this nation pay ZERO income taxes.
The "rich" and the middle class get screwed in this country. The "poor" have NEVER had it better, as the wealth transfer process is pushing Marxist type boundaries in America.
Your pastor is nuts. You did right to walk out. I did the same thing when my priest in my Catholic church paraphrased the same crap about four years ago.
If you need actual/offical data, please send me a private email.
The statistics are grossly slanted. A huge portion of the people in poverty are illegal immigrants and the children of single parents.
If you graduate from high school, don't have kids until you are married and stay married your chances of not living in poverty are tremendously elevated.
Higher taxes may hurt the rich but they hurt those trying to break out of poverty even more.
For ye have the poor with you always, and whensoever ye will ye may do them good: but me ye have not always.
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