Date: Sat Oct 11 16:08:18 1997
To: Frank Grose
From: Rob Weinberg
Subject: Back to square one.
At 09:38 AM 10/11/97 0500, you wrote:
When I read about the Pilgrims and all the hardships they endured, and how much they relied on God to watch over them and to preserve the colony, and I think how we as a nation have become "self reliant" and are pushing God out of society, I weep for my nation.
'Course, them heathen injuns who kept the pilgrims alive didn't hurt, neither. And we sure did the right neighborly thing by them for "thanks" too. Hey, I'm not saying God didn't have a part in it, 'could'a even made sure the Indians were there, since the pilgrims sure didn't know how to take care of themselves. Blind faith, in the absence of all else, can indeed work miracles, I'll accept that. But let's give a little credit where credit is due too. Look at the Mormons and the Oregon Trail. Those people were nuts, but they got there, probably because they were nuts. But the idea that God put us in the hands of the Indians to get through those times, leads to this mentality that the land and everybody on it is just there for us to take as long as we believe in God, 'cause he put it there for us, and to hell with everybody else.
I've tried reading parts of it aloud to my family, and I break up. To see where we once were in our reliance on God to where we now are as a national society is very upsetting to me. I love my country that much. The Pilgrims saw themselves in much the same role as the Children of Israel coming to "The Promised Land."
Yeah, see above. Frank, with all due respect to your beliefs and personal affection for you, get over it. Does it not occur to you that God would want us to be as self reliant as we can be? Being self reliant does not necessarily mean we need not be thankful or grateful or give up our faith. It just means we don't have to be so clingy, and dependent on God to do for us what we can do for ourselves, and more importantly, our neighbor. How many nails have you driven for Habitat for Humanity? Made any contributions to Amnesty International lately? Do you separate your garbage between recyclables and other waste? Done any "Big Brother" work through your church for kids living in the projects? Do you check off that extra dollar on your Alabama Power bill? Spent time in a soup kitchen lately? Contributed to a shelter for battered women? Have you asked any of the homeless in Huntsville if there's anything you can do for them? This is "the message" I'd want spread if I were God.
Saying that people aren't going to church enough anymore is an easy answer, but it's misleading. Statistically, people are going the same amount as they were before, if not more. But since then, problems that used to be hidden are more visible, which is good, because it means we should be dealing with them. All the sins to you: drug and alcohol abuse, child abuse, incest, wife beating, homosexuality, theft and robbery, rape and murder. They were always there, and you're fooling yourself if you want to believe otherwise.
Now, I'll grant you that there's also something more invidious and insidious going on too. Kids are killing kids, committing heinous, atrocious crimes we'd not have dreamed of when you and I were kids. And I don't have the answer, but they're growing up in third world country conditions, right in our own backyard. We spend more on building prisons than we do on schools, when we KNOW that better schools and child care would solve a major part of the problem. (How willing would you be to vote for an increase in property taxes, double them, if it went to schools. I'd do it in a heartbeat, everyone else votes against it. How much of a sacrifice are you willing to make, to make this world a better place, like it was, or so we're told, when it was founded?)
The Europeans came to this country and they TOOK IT, by force. What he did not destroy with the diseases he carried, he simply appropriated to himself. When he ran out of room, he took some more. We made slaves out of the people who were already here, taught them to make slaves of one another (although many tribes did that already), and brought slaves ourselves. When we'd sucked the life out of the land we had, we moved westward and repeated the story over and over again. This is what God had in mind back when we were more of a God fearing nation?
And we did all this with God's assistance, or blessing. That's the moral of how our country was founded.
Like the pilgrims looking for their own promised land, we drove the Mormons out of the Ohio Valley to look for their own. The westward expansion, beginning with the flight from Europe to the Americas was always in the name of religious freedom, to escape from persecution, and no one, NO ONE, seems to be getting the big picture. And I'll tell you what's missing from the big picture. Those who take never give back, they've just taken and moved on. There's just something not very Christ-like about this scenario. If that's what it means to be a Christian nation, you may understand why I really don't care to lay claim to it.
After reading that section, take a Bible and read Deuteronomy chapter 28 and look for the parallels with our own country. It is frightening to see and to know that God is true to His word.
We're always gonna' see parallels, especially when we want to and when we're looking for them. Read your horoscope at the end of the day, and 9 times out of 10, it'll seem right on point to what happened to you that day. What makes the Bible a great work, divinely inspired or not, is that it is a compilation of universal stories, that man continues to repeat. Why? Because man refused to learn, or is incapable from learning, from the past. So the old stories always seem new. No big miracle there, man just ain't that bright.
I don't want Christianity to be an "in your face" or "you're going to hell if you don't do this" situation. I just would like to see those who happen to not believe the way I do be tolerant with those who want to continue to ask God's blessing and guidance on their lives and their endeavors.
I dunno, Frank. We seem to be going round and round on this one. Don't know if you've had a chance to read the memos I sent. It's a lie, Frank. Whoever told you that people are trying to suck God out of the system, or trying to turn the country into some godless society is lying to you. There are many, many, many, more people out there, in this country, let alone this world, who don't believe as you do. I think you're confusing the fact of their existence with some threat to your God. Nobody's out to get you or take your God from you. Period. That chicken-little-the-sky-is-falling argument carries no weight with me, it never will. It is ... a lie.
It is a tradition that has been held to since the colonial era, both in private, government, and public situations.
Believe that all you need to if that is a tenet of your faith, although why it's a necessary part of your relationship with God is beyond my grasp. You have been fed a selective view of history that scholars without an agenda are still debating. You want to go through history and pick and chose the parts that suit your arguments and your beliefs, fine. Even assuming for the sake of argument that were true, what value is it? 200+ years makes you more right and closer to your God? You can't trace your church back to colonial times. Why do you fudge history or your analysis with such an argument? Those are the same fallback arguments used by the segregationists in the 50's and 60's. They're great rhetoric for inciting passion, but they add nothing to the debate.
It is indeed troubling to see the God who established and preserved and prospered this nation now treated with such disdain by the government and society.
I just can't respond to this. What the believers of your faith (all faiths, but we're picking on Christianity generically at the moment) have done to this land itself, the people it found here, the people it brought here unwillingly, and the people who came here looking for a better place than what they left behind is a sacrilege. Particularly that they did it in the name of God or said that God was on their side while they did it.
It's just a lie, Frank. God is not treated with disdain by the ACLU’ers and their ilk (like me). It's the people who claim God gave them the right to take and destroy, to belittle, ignore and castigate in the name of THEIR God that are treated that way. It's classic transference. It's the man and his hypocrisy that's being attacked, not God. It's what he does, not what he believes, that people like me find objectionable.
As a Christian, I believe there is only one way to Heaven (That is why Judge Moore cannot invite a Buddhist to pray in his courtroom, and would lose the respect and support of Christians if he did.),
But it's OK, to lose the respect and support of the Jews, Catholics, Buddhists, Muslims, atheists, agnostics, deists, the chinese, the japanese, the blacks, the hispanics, the indians, the immigrants, etc., because (1) they're not in the majority; and (2) there's a "historic tradition" of ignoring the minority's feelings on the subject dating back to colonial days. What have I left out Frank? Why does the hypocrisy of Moore's defense not scream at you like it does at me?
See, it's Moore that's saying "my way or the highway," it's Moore who says "my way or no way at all." The highway ain't an option, 'cause this is my country too, and it was never his to begin with. That leaves "my way or no way at all." If that's the only option Moore sees, then fine. I'd rather have no way than his way. Because that's the choice he gives me. Is any of this making sense?
but I prefer to present the Gospel to others in a gentle and loving way. They must believe it to accept it. But it is always the option of those with whom it is shared to simply say, "No, thank you." That is where my responsibility ends. I don't push it.
Yes, you don't push it. You share. And while the less secure and hypersensitive of my "ilk" might see things differently, I see the distinction and applaud you for it. I've said before that Christians like you give Christianity a good name. So stop believing the lie when people like Moore tell you I'm attacking YOUR faith when I'm trying to put a stop to HIS abuses.
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