Kentucky: Epicenter of the Moral Universe?

For the handful of folks who read this blog, you know I take my Christian faith seriously.  Now let me frustrate many of you.  Two current stories are being lumped together which are separated by a chasm of gargantuan magnitude.  Both arise from Kentucky, right in the heart of the Bible belt.

                                                               

One story involves a clerk in Rowan County Kentucky who refuses to issue marriage licenses to homosexual couples because, she says, it violates her sincerely held religious beliefs and her rights under the First Amendment to exercise her religion.  The other story is about a volunteer Chaplain who has been working in a juvenile detention center in Kentucky for 13 years who was told to sign a document saying he wouldn’t teach what the Bible says about homosexuality or quit.  Both involve Christians; one has a beef, the other doesn’t.

First, the one with the beef.  David Wells was, for 13 years, a Christian chaplain from a Southern Baptist Church at the Warren County Juvenile Detention Center.  It’s not like the state of Kentucky didn’t know what he was doing all this time – he offered his services as a counselor who was explicitly Christian.  Moreover, he was volunteering – so he was there out of a genuine concern for young people, not to pick up a paycheck.  He also has a background that allowed him to empathize with these young people, having been a victim of abuse as a child.  He wasn’t coming into this with rose-colored glasses on, idealistically assuming every young person he met would immediately become an award winning citizen.  What he offered was a shoulder to cry on and hope through the power of healing that truly comes from only one person: Jesus Christ.

The state of Kentucky has decided that the biblical teaching on LGBTQ issues amounts to “derogatory language” that “conveys bias or hatred” towards young folks struggling with these issues.  Therefore, it is banned.  Sign or you’re out.  What could Wells do?  Lie?  Sign the document knowing he wasn’t going to follow it?  No, as a true Christian, he refused to sign.  Some might say, look at the good you could have done, you’re hurting the kids.  FALSE.  The message he was giving those kids was one of hope through Christ – he can’t offer that without honestly teaching what the Bible says.  He was given what we often call a Hobson’s Choice – take what’s offered or nothing.

He took a principled stand – and the state of Kentucky lost a sincere, decent counselor who can no longer impact the lives of desperate young people in need.  In the meantime, the state of Kentucky took a step towards Orwellian madness – it is now hateful to offer people an opportunity for eternal life in heaven with the God of the universe.  Moreover, it is biased against Christianity (and other religions, too, by the way) to prevent the suggestion that LGBTQ is not sinful.  There is bias either way. 

Then there is the Rowan County Clerk, Kim Davis.  She has three problems, in my view.  One is biblical, one is legal, one is ethical.  NOTE: Before you get too angry at me, I do agree with Ms. Rowan that the Bible does not condone gay marriage and that it is morally wrong.  Nonetheless, I don't agree with how she is handling herself; nor do I agree with the lawyers who are handling her case.

The biblical argument against her actions arises from reviewing the actions of Daniel in Chapter Six of the Book of Daniel.  In that situation, the King was getting ready to appoint Daniel as what we might call Prime Minister.  Daniel’s political enemies got the king to pass a dopey law requiring everyone to pray only to him for 30 days.  Daniel, knowing what was going down, nonetheless continued his normal practice of praying to the God of the universe, not the king. He was caught and thrown into a lion’s den.  You know the rest of the story (if not, read Daniel 6).  Ms. Davis is, likewise, a governmental employee confronted with an edict with which she disagrees.  Note, however, the difference: Daniel never once went to the king to ask for some sort of exception.  He didn’t croon about his rights.  He simply, and quietly, knowing the consequences, went about his everyday business, which was not related to his actual job, by the way.  Daniel obviously had significant sway with Darius, given the position he was going to be given (and was, in the end).  He could have made his arguments, could have attempted to use his influence to in some way make an arrangement with the king but he did not.  Ms. Davis is doing just the opposite: she’s specifically defying “the king” and thumbing her nose at the crown all the while.  She is making demands of the government, not humbly accepting the consequences her actions might entail.  Daniel acted in complete understanding that God is sovereign; Ms. Davis is acting like the First Amendment is sovereign.

Secondly, Ms. Davis cannot properly argue, under the law, that as a public servant she can willy-nilly decide which laws she will obey and which she won’t because of her Christian beliefs.  If such is the case, then she undermines the very principle of the rule of law on which the United States is based.  The rule of law says that government workers don’t get to determine for themselves what laws should and shouldn’t be obeyed.  For this reason, Jack Conway, Kentucky’s Attorney General was rightly excoriated by some for his failure to defend Kentucky’s marriage law during the Obergfell case (the recent gay marriage case).  One of the very arguments made about the tyranny of the current president is that he seems to think he can act without regard to the laws, making his presidency one based on the rule of man, not law.  Ms. Davis is doing precisely the same thing, just from a different perspective.  In this, she is just dead wrong.

Finally, and worst of all, Ms. Davis has an enormous ethical problem.  Before now, did she question every person who came in about their previous marital status?  To how many divorcees who divorced for unbiblical reasons has her office issued marriage licenses?  Were her Christian beliefs not frustrated by those marriages?  These are valid questions that many non-Christians (and at least this Christian) will ask, and rightly so.  It is an inconsistency of the highest order to suggest one’s religious beliefs concerning marriage concern only gay marriage and not other unbiblical marriages. 

Mr. Wells did what he had to do.  He acted on conscience and quietly left.  Ms. Rowan is making a mockery of her position and, unless she’s prepared to tell us she never once issued a marriage license to an improperly divorced person, she needs to rethink her position immediately.  She’s ignoring the lessons of Daniel, but instead is placing her faith in the First Amendment instead of the God of the universe.  

Michael Sam: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow?

On February 11, 2014, I wrote about Michael Sam, the football player who spoke out about being a homosexual.  I said then I thought it was odd that those who report on the NFL made such a big deal about it (by that I mostly mean ESPN).  I wondered aloud about it because I had always heard that what mattered most was “what happens on the field.”  Ask Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson if that’s true . . .

But I digress.  Here’s my question: now that Michael Sam has decided to take a break from football for “mental” reasons, can we draw any conclusions about his rapid ascension and equally rapid decline in the horrifically short-lived thing called the American mind?  Obviously, I intend to offer some thoughts.

First, Michael Sam was under no obligation to discuss his sexual proclivities.  My suspicion (just speculating here) is that he talked to someone: an agent, a marketing executive, an advertiser, who told him just getting drafted would make him tons of money because he’s gay.  Maybe he did it to put pressure on the NFL?  I don’t know.  So he “came out.”  His sexual orientation has no bearing, so far as I can understand it, on how he performed as a football player, any more than it would if he were an accountant, a doctor, a cashier, a plumber or any other occupation.  I don’t need to know if my plumber is gay; what I need to know is whether my plumber can install a dishwasher, unclog a pipe, or fix a leak.  Michael Sam’s sexual orientation was never important to most people, except ESPN and others who are militant in their desire to push a so-called Progressive social agenda.  Of course, the NFL is a media-savvy, advertising-savvy organization which knew full well that failure to draft Sam, once he announced his sexual orientation, would have resulted in the media erupting, Mt. St. Helen’s like, with a wall of hot ash scorching the NFL for homophobia.  Someone had to take Sam.  Whether Sam himself, or some adviser, thought up the idea, he put himself in a position to get drafted.  And it worked.

Second, it is obvious after stints with the Rams and the Cowboys that Michael Sam was never going to be an NFL player.  He had one really great season with Missouri which landed him an award as the conference’s best defensive player.  Skill at college football doesn’t always mean skill in the pros.  Skill at the second best level in any arena of life doesn’t necessarily translate into skill at the next level.  The kid who wins the high school talent contest may or may not become the next great actor, singer, or whatever.  The accountant who works for the best firm in a small town may not find his or her skills really quite meet the standards when moving to the fast paced and cutthroat environment in one of America’s major metropolitan areas.   That’s just an assessment of how life works.  That doesn’t slight Sam – many high school football players never get to the “big” leagues of college football and labor in obscurity in much smaller venues, often (very often) without scholarships.  After all, Sam was drafted only 7 places before the very last player drafted, the man who gets named “Mr. Irrelevant.”  There was no shame in him not making it – many 7^th rounders don’t.  For that matter, there are plenty of first round draft choices who bombed out!

Third, one wonders what it means that he’s leaving his current team, the Montreal Alouettes for “mental” reasons.  He needs a break.  From what?  He  hasn’t truly played a significant amount of football since he was drafted back in 2014.  My guess (again, speculation) is that Sam thought he was cashing in and is at a loss to understand why everyone isn’t rushing in to get a piece of the action.  Sam is feeling the pressure of not truly making the cut.  From what I understand, he didn’t play in his first game for the Canadian team, either.  I predict he will never play professional football, ever.  For whatever reason, it’s not where his skills lie.  Seems maybe he invested too much in the fame of being the “first openly gay” professional football player.

I am a great lover of irony.  There is an irony here.  Now that gay marriage is the law of the land, and being gay is okay, nobody actually cares anymore!  It’s no longer a big deal for anyone to come out as gay.  Michel Sam can’t cash in because there’s nothing about his situation that demands cashing in.  Yes, ESPN dutifully ran a story about his leaving his current team (it’s on the website, if you really look hard for it).  I don’t watch much ESPN, so I don’t know how much TV coverage it got, but I’ll bet it got one quick mention then a move on, at best; more likely, it was relegated to the crawler at the bottom of the screen.

This is where the all the gay rights activists have made a mistake.  You’re always a darling when you’re an outsider trying to get in, but once you’re there (wherever “there” is), you are part of the inside gang.  Nobody cares anymore.  Now you can’t complain about how you’re treated because you’re part of the group that is doing the “treating.”  I suspect Michael Sam is wondering what happened to all the fame and notoriety that was supposed to come his way?  He may well have built his well-being on this idea.  Now that it’s not happening (hey Sam, you missed a tackle, hey Sam, you look slow, hey Sam what the *%$#^ were you thinking) it doesn’t surprise me he may be struggling.

This is why Christianity actually has a worthwhile answer to life’s problems.  The Christian world view says when I place my spiritual well-being in the hands of other human beings or myself I am in for problems.  No matter how well-intended, no matter how thoughtful, other human beings will always (yes, always) let me down in some way.  I’m not a perfect husband and have let my wife down over the years in different ways.  Fortunately, she knows I can’t supply her spiritual well-being.  Any well-adjusted person knows their own shortcomings.  The Bible paints a picture of maladjusted humans finding solace in one place: the Messiah of all humanity, Jesus Christ.  The Old Testament describes him as the coming Messiah, the New Testament describes him as the now-here Messiah, and both describe him as the “as to come” Messiah. 

Michael Sam apparently put his spiritual well-being in the hands of ESPN, maybe some advertisers (he had one credit card commercial), the NFL, and the CFL.  Unfortunately, none of that is working out, so he now has to “take a break.”  He’s cracking under the pressure that he doesn’t measure up and being a homosexual won’t solve this existential crisis.  Either the Bible is true and accurate in its reporting of the human condition (read it and you’ll find it’s blunt about the human condition) or it’s not.  If it is, and the living God of the universe is speaking to us through the pages of the Bible, then there is only one place for Michael Sam to solve his problems: in the waiting arms of Jesus Christ. 

ESPN doesn’t care that Sam didn’t make it.  Neither do the Rams, the Cowboys or the Alouettes.  They’ve tossed him aside like yesterday’s fish.  God, through the atoning power of the blood of Christ will never do that.  I hope someone is able to talk with Sam and get him to hear this message before it is too late for him.

Senator Reid and President Obama's Moral Compass Points Straight to Hell

“It’s our responsibility in the Senate to assure that American women have access to care,” Minority Leader Harry Reid said. “It’s our obligation to protect our wives, our sisters, our daughters, our granddaughters — protect them from the absurd policies of a Republican Party that’s lost its moral compass.”

Senator Reid made this statement in the face of the callous videos which have surfaced showing executives from the Planned Non-Parenthood casually discussing its sale of body parts following abortions.  Note that Planned Parenthood isn’t selling dog parts, or cat parts, or even ant or amoeba parts; no, Planned Parenthood is selling human body parts.  The reason Senator Reid must spout such nonsense is that the Democratic party has inextricably tied itself to abortion on demand as an inalienable right of all women in the United States and Planned Parenthood is the single largest provider of abortions in the country.  Hillary Clinton has leaped to its defense, as has the Obama administration.

Interestingly, none of Planned Parenthood’s defenders are following the advice of Janet Harris, about whom I wrote (here), who suggested abortion advocates stop arguing about the morality of abortion.  Senator Reid should have taken her advice because his statement is utterly irrational, unreasonable and, frankly, laughable.

Unless by “access to care” Senator Reid means access to abortions provided by Planned Parenthood, then no Republican was arguing against “access to care.”  Thus, I guess we are to take away from Senator Reid’s comment that access to care truly must mean access to abortions provided by Planned Parenthood.  If what he meant was access to abortion, shouldn’t he have simply said so?  If abortion is an inalienable right, or is, at least, a moral good, than why the euphemistic language?  Why not just say abortion is a moral good?  Senator Reid can’t say abortion is a moral good because people are realizing that very young babies in utero are no longer just “fetuses” or “tissue” but are actual human beings whose body parts are being sold for profit, like the new Apple watch or something.  Moreover, arguing that an organization which cold-heartedly seeks to profit by organ harvesting after cruelly cutting off a human life deserves government funding seems a little odd.  Typically, elected officials like to be seen as protecting life, especially human life, right?  Senator Reid is engaging in political doubletalk, reminiscent of Orwell’s 1984.  So the moral compass to which Senator Reid refers obviously means the moral compass that points to abortion on demand as an inviolable moral good.

Moreover, Senator Reid makes no actual connection between “access to care” and the Republicans Party losing its “moral compass.”  This statement presumes two things: (1) “access to care” whatever that means, is a moral good and (2) the Republican Party used to think “access to care” was a good idea but has changed its mind.  Well, if access to care means abortion on demand, and abortion on demand is the moral good Harry Reid is proclaiming, then the Republican party has never had its moral compass pointing in the correct direction.  Thus, it hasn’t lost its moral compass, as it either never had one or was always pointing the wrong way.  This is simply following Senator Reid’s statements to their logical conclusion.  So we now know that can’t be what Senator Reid meant, right?  He wouldn’t say something so starkly absurd, and lacking any logic, right?

You see, Janet Harris was ironically correct.  If you are going to be pro-abortion, you can’t try to stake out the moral high ground because it simply isn’t there.  Medical science is making clearer and clearer that babies in the womb are just that: babies.   Human babies, at that.  They’re not “undifferentiated tissue” or some other scientific sounding way of making them less human.  Moreover, the sale of body parts is making clear what most reasonable people have always known: abortion is the killing of a human being.  Senator Reid’s statement is pure political baloney, designed to assuage the consciences of everyone who wants abortion on demand.  Whether it makes sense or not is wholly irrelevant.  He’s performing political theater, strutting and fretting his hour upon the stage, until he is heard no more.

BREAKING STORY: As I was writing this, it turns out President Obama told a group of African college students that selling human body parts was immoral.  Oh, sure the context was different (apparently some African groups will kill African albinos, then sell their body parts), but aren’t human beings, all human beings?  That’s exactly what President Obama told these students.  Yet, in his world, apparently unless you make it outside of your mother’s womb, you aren’t human.  His administration jumped on the Planned Non-Parenthood defense team, stoking fires of “extremist” by claiming that somehow the because the videos were the work of alleged “extremists” this means they should be disregarded.  (Never mind the videos show what they show, and the Planned Parenthood executives are saying what they are saying – that’s not relevant in the Obama-Reid world).

Apparently, then, one’s moral compass need point only in whatever direction is convenient for the moment, depending upon to whom one is talking?  That seems to be the gist of it.

The Reid-Obama “morality” simply means whatever works for me right now to get what I want.  Thus, I guess, in a sense, Senator Reid is right about Republicans losing their moral compass, since in his world morality means whatever he says it means, when he says it, how he says it.

This is the end game of the secularist.  Like Humpty Dumpty, the secularist makes words mean whatever he wants them to mean.  Access to care (i.e. the inalienable right to abortion) is a moral good, so Republicans who seek to limit it are losing their moral compass.  But killing people in Africa and harvesting their body parts for sale is immoral, and those who are doing it have lost their moral compass.  But Planned Parenthood is morally good for helping women maintain their reproductive rights.  But really what we mean when we say reproductive rights is the right to not reproduce in the form of abortion.  Up is down.  Right is left.  Good is evil.  Evil is good.  Confuse people so you can then help them understand why they are so confused and need you to fix it for them.

When we untether ourselves from an understanding that we are beings created in the image of the living God, we lose rationality and morality.  As Stephen Crane wrote so many years ago, the universe feels no "sense of obligation" just because we exist.  In fact, it feels nothing, does nothing, moves nothing, provides nothing, proclaims nothing.  If we insist on this secularist course, our moral and rational worlds come crashing down because no reason for either morality or rationality exist.   I find it ironic that I can quote Ozzy Osbourne here: “Satan laughing, spreads his wings.”[1]  Neither Senator Reid, nor President Obama are rational or moral here.  Both are, quite simply, doing Satan’s work, unintentionally or not.  Their “moral compass” is pointing straight to hell. 

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[1] “War Pigs” by Black Sabbath from the album Paranoid.