STILL MAKES ME_______ FILL IN THE BLANK

I posted this several years ago when I was going through my "you've got to be kidding, wait until you really face persecution" phase. I'm a few years older. The fundies still have a persecution complex.

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From Benjamin Corey’s blog about so called persecution of Christians in this country. 

"Ken Ham referenced an Atlanta Fire Chief who wrote a book condemning homosexuality etc. Up front he has the right to write the book. He has the right to use it in his Bible study class. He didn’t have the right to bring copies of his self published tome to the fire house and try to distribute them to his subordinates. He didn’t lose his job because he was a Christian. He lost it, in part, because he was using his position to in effect intimidate those under him. This is the comment that set off my post.

That firefighter has a duty to preach the Gospel of Christ. What he did was not wrong in any sense, him being fired is just another example of what a godless, pagan culture we live in .

Christians have been persecuted since Christ ascended to heaven. We will not stop being laughed at and mocked at until Christ returns." My old post below. 

Guess what. If you insist that the earth is only 6,000 years old. That the earth is the center of the universe and that the Bible is a science text book don’t be surprised if the most polite reactions are snickers behind the hands followed by quick exits and hysterical laughter from the other side of the door. That’s not persecution. It’s pity. Especially for any kids you may be “home schooling.”

Now on to the subject at hand. He did not have duty to preach the gospel on the taxpayers dime in a public building supported with the taxes of every citizen of the city to his subordinates. He can preach all he wants, hire a hall, stand on a street corner, build his own church. Nobody is going to stop him. Probably won't even throw ripe tomatoes at him.

To those who cry persecution when what is really happening is that you are finally being treated like everybody else.

I assume your pastor is still walking free. Hasn’t been arrested. Hasn’t suddenly disappeared. Hasn’t been gunned down in a local cane field. Update. Happened to a Jesuit priest named Rutilio Grande back in the late seventies in El Salvador. Big mistake. Also murdered were an old man and a boy who had the bad luck to be with father Grande when his car was riddled with gunfire.

Helped turn a nice, quiet, devout, hardly ever said a hard word, newly minted
 archbishop named Oscar Romero into a passionate voice for the poor and truly persecuted. Three years later in the spring of 1980 the death squads added the bishop to a death toll that doesn't have an official total. Could be as high as 80,000 in a country that had about five million people. And I don't believe that anyone has ever totaled the number peasants who were forced to flee the country and ended up in refugee camps in Honduras. 

Back to the original post

Anybody try to stop you from going to church. Any troops or cops blocking the entrance to the parking lot on Sunday morning. If you hold a Bible study at home are there any unmarked cars parked across the street watching who is coming and going? Any soldiers show up and turn your church into a barracks. Can a Catholic lay church worker make a delivery of consecrated Hosts to a small rural church without fear of being searched and murdered by the local death squads? Guatalamala.

 Ever see any graffiti on the walls that reads along the lines of “be a patriot, kill a priest? El Salvador. 

Has any congregation in this country ever been told at the end of funeral as mourners in Latin America attending a mass for murdered student activists were told, “stay inside the cathedral because the troops are outside and there's nowhere to run?”

Forgive me, I don't remember off hand where this happened. I THINK it was Argentina but I’m not going to bet the farm on it. The priests and other celebrants proceeded to go outside and begin walking towards the soldiers. Miraculously (I guess miracles do happen sometimes) the soldiers fell back and kept falling back until enough space in front of the cathedral had been cleared so that those inside had a fighting chance of getting down an alley or a side street. All of these things happened in Central and South America during the Reagan and Bush I years. And worse.

Oh, and BTW can your church have a cross outside or on the roof without the government (China) telling you to take it down? Or worse bulldoze the whole building. Or arrest you for belonging to a congregation that isn’t sanctioned by the state? Give me a freakin' break.

Here’s some icing for that cake. Has the Christian population of this country fallen by seventy five percent since say, 2003? This is happening in Iraq right now. In part, thanks to our “Crusade” and experiment in regime change. There were nearly a million Christians in Iraq when the war started. The number is closer to a quarter million and some of them are still there just because they haven’t had a chance to leave yet. There have been Christians in that part of the world since the beginning. Some of them still speak Aramaic. 

Since then the total has fallen even lower. 

So much for the trip down memory lane.