This tweet from Veggie Tale creator Phil Vischer is wise and powerful.
Eric, I love you, but your own book talks about Bonhoeffer's deep concern for the plight of blacks in America. I'm pretty sure if he showed up right now he'd be talking about more than just abortion and the "evil left." https://t.co/oBM7wDbOd8
— Phil Vischer (@philvischer) June 7, 2020
Eric Metaxas is a shadow of his former self and his friends know it.
Metaxas answers with a simplication of history and current events and Vischer brings reality to the table.
So… Bonhoeffer would show up, notice that the average black family still has 1/10th the wealth of the ave white family, poor access to education and healthcare, and a black boy has a 1 in 4 chance of being incarcerated, and say, "Good – they solved the black problem."
— Phil Vischer (@philvischer) June 7, 2020
Abortion rates have been declining steadily for 30 years, while white/black inequity has remained steady for nearly 70. Are you sure we're focusing on the right things?
— Phil Vischer (@philvischer) June 7, 2020
Metaxas tries to lower the boom but Vischer again brings the facts.
"Both and," friend. Roe didn't make abortion legal, it made it illegal for states to make it illegal. It was legal in some states pre-Roe, and would continue being legal in some states post-Roe. We can continue reducing the abortion rate while also reducing inequity.
— Phil Vischer (@philvischer) June 7, 2020
Reversing Roe v. Wade will not eliminate abortion. It will remain legal in many states. Don’t use abortion politics as an excuse to avoid action on racism.
In my opinion, it is Vischer for the win in the Bonhoeffer match up.
If anyone has the chance, look up Eric’s debate with David French…(video? or transcript) He really twists the Bonhoeffer story/1930’s Germany into an illogical, ahistorical pretzel, that somehow allows him and his far-right trumpist cult to be the “good guys” and makes out everyone else to be either cowardly bystanders, collaborators or the evil nazis…
Listen, and I mean this with 100% seriousness. If Hitler were to show up today, are we sure Metaxas, the Bonhoeffer fanboy he claims to be, would actually be against him if he were running on an anti-abortion platform? Or, is it more likely he would be excusing the antisemitism and violent rhetoric as “irrelevant” or “locker room talk” and throwing out the red herring of abortion to justify why all Christian must support him.
Shall we pretend that because some progress has been made, our work is done and everybody should just shut up?
Also, weird how the woke anarchists are the ones standing up against inequality, while many of the “Pro Life” people are defending the unjust status quo or denying it’s existence. I have a funny feeling the cause of Christ isn’t yoked by the woke anarchists.
Less social inequality >>> less abortion (one can see this when comparing the incidences of abortion in, say, the UK and [more socially-equal] Germany). Highlighting abortion ‘as opposed to’ striving for greater social inclusion and equality of opportunity is completely missing the point.
Or, perhaps it IS the point.
Especially when it became another Litmus Test of Salvation.
I was on the fringes of the Pro-Life movement in the Eighties, and noticed something:
Every Pro-Life activist group had its own way of Ending Abortion and Only that One True Way:
* National Right To Life Committee (NRLC) – Elect Godly Republicans who WILL appoint Godly Supreme Court Justices who WILL Overturn Roe v Wade. The GOP (“God’s Only Party”) strung them along with this one over 40 years until Trump proved his Messiahood by actually DOING it.
* American Life League (ALL) – NRLC in ALL CAPS AND BOLDFACE!!!!! During the Bork nomination circus, I got phoned by their telemarketers demanding money to get Bork confirmed or Threat of Eternal Hellfire. (Using proper code words, of course – “If Bork is Not Confirmed, GOD WILL HOLD YOU ACCOUNTABLE FOR ALL THE BABIES WHO WERE MURDERED BECAUSE YOU DIDN’T CONTRIBUTE!” I am not making that up.)
* Operation Rescue – Shut down abortuaries through civil disobedience and go to jail to show your dedication to The Cause. “IF YOU’RE NOT BEING ARRESTED WITH US, YOU’RE JUST ANOTHER ABORTIONIST!!!!!”
And none of these Activist groups would even talk to each other — the Universe Cannot Have Two One True Ways. All they did was infight over The One True Way.
This is still true. The anti-abortion guys formerly at the church near to me (they moved 40 miles away during the pandemic because their landlord, another church, wouldn’t let them continue to hold services), they think regular pro-lifers are just wimps. These guys, including “apologist” James White, believe women who have abortions should be executed.
On the subject of misogyny, any updates on the fraud Mark Driscoll?
He’s still regularly posting back at Patheos, on a wide range of evangelical platitudes (such as “will our pets be in heaven”).
“THE GOP (God’s Only Party)”
Not only is that theologically abhorrent, but it aged like milk.
Well, yes – it is just too convenient to alight on one issue in isolation in order to avoid confronting the wider context.
If Metaxas hadn’t blocked me back in 2016 when I called him out about that fake Bonhoeffer quote (thanks, Warren, for doing the dissection on that). I’d give him an earful about abortion. I would point out that women got illegal abortions prior to 1973, and if abortion were to be made illegal on Tuesday, women would get abortions on Wednesday*. We know what brings down the abortion rate–comprehensive sex education and unfettered access to contraception–but Evangelicals as a group tend not to be in favor of this. I’d also point out the hypocrisy of claiming Evangelicals took the lead in being anti-slavery (which is pretty close to untrue, look at the Southern Baptist Convention), while at the same time insisting that women must remain pregnant against our will which is a version of slavery.
* For all we know, in states where abortion access has been heavily limited, “illegal” abortions are being performed every day, likely through the administration of mifepristone and misoprolol, pills that were not available prior to 1973.
Beyond sex education/contraception, I think the economic angle is as strong or more. ie if evangelicals were truly pro-life, they would support; no they would earnestly contend for Any and All measures that would make child birth and rearing of children the least burdensome thing possible… but then they couldn’t be the social Darwinist/libertarian/free market fundamentalists that their particular Biblical interpretations compell them to be… and that just wouldn’t do…(especially for their rich donor class…who would no doubt have to contribute real dollars to such efforts. That would be too hard (persecution!)… much easier on the wallet to just vote red, throw a few campaign dollars to the red team, rake in the tax abatement’s and pander with words and some federal judges now and then…
Yeah, the anti-abortion people I’ve talked to are also against making life better for the children already here. You can’t convince them that making sure kids have enough to eat and a roof over their heads is a good thing. You just can’t.
I am so sorry.
I am against abortion and my favorite use of my tax dollars is supporting needy people, especially children. I’m glad to make it easier for those kids to be taken care of. (Also, WTF is with the migrant kids in cages? How can someone who opposes abortion for rape/incest possibly support this brutality against innocent children?)
There are others like me, but we are sadly too sparse.
I get tired of Evangelicals trotting out Wilberforce as if he was the end all to be all in religious people opposing slavery. He wasn’t. Evangelicals can’t seem to bring themselves to acknowledge that the radical American Quakers were there first. Benjamin Lay (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Lay) was causing commotions (and getting kicked out of) Quaker Meetings twenty years before Wilberforce was born. And while John Woolman (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Woolman) was quieter, he was no less radical in his own way, as well as being highly influential in Quaker circles.
I remember arguing unsuccessfully with Karen Swallow Prior about how late to the game Wilberforce and Hannah More came to the anti-slavery movement. There seems to be a real blind spot with Evangelicals, probably because they don’t accept the old-style non-Evangelical Quakers as “true Christians” (whatever that means).
I am not surprised how Metaxas draws every discussion back to abortion. That issue has been used as the trump card (no pun intended) to justify support for any and all manner of evangelical support for other issues, and even to justify fawning devotion to individual politicians. I could perhaps buy this if I really heard people saying that they had significant issues with various policies or political stances or politicians, but had no choice other to reluctantly support them because of the abortion issue. But that is not what I am hearing. I am hearing full-throated enthusiastic support for *everything* these politicians do and say, and *every* policy they enact or propose. At some point it becomes crystal clear that while Metaxas (and so many others) continues to fall back onto the abortion justification, he (and so many others) is in fact fully on board with every other thing the current administration is saying and doing. Wherever they go, he (and they) will follow. There is a word that comes to mind for this complete devotion: worship.
One thing I’ve been noticing lately has been Christians explicitly saying that they CANNOT support BLM because it supports LGBTQ people. In much the same way as you CANNOT support any candidate except those who oppose abortion.
Now I’m a Christian who believes the Bible. Abortion is wrong and Homosexual acts are sin. But this doesn’t mean that those who support them cannot be trusted in anything else. BLM has tried for many years to expose the problem of police brutality in the US and has been targeted by many conservatives as a “terrorist group”… which in recent times has come back to bite conservatives who are now, finally, seeing what BLM is actually about. So are we going to NOT support the actions of BLM just because they support homosexuality? Are Christians ONLY ever going to support group which meet Christian teaching 100%? If that is the case, then the only groups we should support are theocratic.
I agree with you in your assessment of this and in your questioning of it. They are dismissing what is a clearly valid message because they disagree with some aspects of the messenger’s approach. I actually see some evangelical leaders saying that this constitutes being “unequally yoked.” But the infuriating thing is, they themselves are perfectly willing to be “unequally yoked” when it comes to amplifying all sorts of messengers who are saying what they want to hear. Utter inconsistency, They would argue it is because their concerns are so critical and so imperative that it requires doing so. Which just goes to show you how far down they place racism and institutionalized racial violence on their hierarchy of concerns.
I also see them dismissing attempts to address the racial concerns via political means and/or legislatively, saying that racism is a sin/heart issue, so the only change that would be effective is God changing hearts through Christ. Well, that is an argument that starts with a point of truth but then falls into more inconsistency. They themselves place huge value on pushing for legislation of their primary concerns through political means, and would never dream of shrugging their shoulders and saying, oh well, not much we can do, God will just have to change hearts.
Right on the money, especially the blatant inconsistency with the “God changing hearts through Christ” line…
The argument “Oh we should only ever preach the Gospel, that is the only solution” is only true insofar as it is the message from God about salvation and the cure for original sin. But this betrays an over-realised gospel eschatology and creates the concept that the Gospel is simply a “cure all” for any and every bad situation. People who become Christians aren’t all going to magically become sinless, law abiding people here on earth before the return of Jesus.
Then add to this the fact that there ARE things that can be done to improve life here on earth that don’t involve a regeneration by the Holy Spirit. People CAN become better people outside of the direct saving work of God. Of course this “getting better” does not save them or grants them eternal life, but that is not the point. The point is what they can do NOW.
And what are these things? Universal health care, public education, pension and unemployment benefits, social housing, an accountable police force, less guns, the decriminalisation of drugs… the list can go on.
But for whatever reason, Christians oppose these ideas because they are “Socialist” and don’t focus on “personal responsibility” when in fact they oppose them because they don’t want to pay more taxes and have been brainwashed by generations of free-market ideology spread by people like the atheist Ayn Rand and somehow think that “the Christian worldview” is equivalent to minarchism.
I’m a conservative Christian, and I’m also a social democrat from Australia. I also know that there are people who post here who aren’t Social Democrats like me, and would have a problem with some of the policies I’ve mentioned above. And that’s fine… come up with some alternatives that don’t involve the continuation of the status quo and which don’t label social programs as always a failure (because they’re not… I’ve seen them work here in Australia). But whatever you do, don’t somehow argue that minarchism is an inherently Christian ideology. It’s not. Nor is Social democracy, by the way, but that’s the point… I see it as a viable option rather than as a divine command.
(Edit: note that I see Social Democratic policies as helpful in making a better society. I am not trying to create a utopia.)
I’ve included here a short statement about my beliefs as a Christian and being a Social Democrat. I’ve copied and pasted this on a number of different forums, including Reddit:
—
I am an evangelical/reformed Christian and would describe myself as a
Social Democrat.
This means I support policies like: Universal health care, public
education, free university tuition, unemployment benefits, disability
and aged pensions. And I also support increased taxes to pay for these.
I do not follow “the social gospel”. No one gets to heaven by Social
Democratic policies. The only way to heaven is through repentance and
faith in Christ for the forgiveness of sin. Moreover, I do not see
Social Democratic policies as attempting to build “Heaven on Earth. I
do, however, see these policies as making life on earth better. Not
perfect, not a utopia, but just better.
Social Democratic policies are not prescribed in the Bible. But neither
are they proscribed.
Minarchism (the opposite of social democracy) is not prescribed or
proscribed in the Bible either.
The best Bible passages to support Social Democracy are the gleaning
passages in the OT (Leviticus 19.9-10 and Deuteronomy 24.19-22). In
both these passages, Israel’s farmers were commanded to leave the sides
of their fields unreaped so that the poor can get food. This was not
charity. It was a command. And it was a redistribution of property –
goods owned by the rich were transferred to the poor so that they may
have enough to eat. If the Bible was against Social Democratic policies,
such an action would not have been prescribed for God’s Old Covenant
people.
Another passage is Genesis 47.13-22 when God saved Egypt through Joseph.
What occurred was essentially the pharaoh taking over private farms,
which would be an ancient form of nationalisation. If the Bible was
against Social Democratic policies, such an action would not have been
prescribed.
Taxation is not theft. The Bible never depicts it as such. Romans 13.6-7
says that Christians should pay taxes. 1 Samuel 8.10-18 does warn that
kings have the power to steal your property and family for their own
selfish and warlike ends, but we’re not talking kings here, we’re
talking government.
Ancient Rome had a grain dole (the “Cura Annonae”). This was present in
Rome during the first century. It was a law that provided free bread to
the needy. None of the NT writers speak about it negatively. In fact they
don’t mention it at all. This is important because the book of Romans,
written to the Christians in Rome, did not require them to oppose it.
Some social democratic social policies support abortion and
homosexuality. While I adhere to the Bible’s stance on these two issues,
I don’t think that making abortion illegal will result in less
abortions, and I don’t think that making homosexual marriage legal will
result in the destruction of the “traditional family”. There have been
too many myths and rumours surrounding the “homosexual agenda” for many
decades within the evangelical community.
Much of modern evangelical Christianity has been infiltrated by
pro-capitalist thinking over the years, to the point where “the
Christian worldview” ends up denying things like welfare payments or
public education or universal healthcare. This is ridiculous.
The Bible’s overwhelming depiction of poor people is that they are not
responsible for their poverty. While some passages warn against laziness
or idleness, the vast majority of poor people are shown to be poor
because of the actions of the rich. eg Proverbs 13.23, 14.21, 14.31,
19.4, 21.13, 22.22, etc (just search for “poor” in both testaments and
you’ll see the overwhelming message)
Social Democrats are not Socialists. A Socialist wants the government to
control all enterprises and capital. By contrast, a Social Democrat sees
a greater part for government to play in society and the economy. Social
Democrats still see a part for the free market to play in societyand the
economy. They just see the government being involved more. Even Bernie
Sanders isn’t trying to destroy capitalism. He’s just a Social Democrat.
While historical examples of Socialism and Communism have persecuted
religions, atheism and anti-religionism is not essential to their belief
system. Modern day Socialists accept religious freedom, even if they do not
agree with certain religious morals being accepted into wider society.
Social Democrats, similarly, support religious freedom.
It is very possible for individuals, households and even entire
countries to become “better”, and to do so without the work of the Holy
Spirit in regenerating them. Many people become better people without
being saved. This is partly a good thing, as it shows God’s common
grace. But they’re not getting to heaven without Christ. Let the
government and society be the place where God enacts his common grace,
and let the church and Christians be the ones who spread God’s saving
grace. I’m saying this because too many Christians argue that the only
way people’s lives can be changed for the better is through the Gospel.
Of course the Gospel does change lives, and it also secures for those
who have faith in Christ the assurance of eternal life, but there are
plenty of things in our world that have improved people’s lives that
aren’t gospel related.
I’ve included here a short statement about my beliefs as a Christian and being a Social Democrat. I’ve copied and pasted this on a number of different forums, including Reddit:
—
I am an evangelical/reformed Christian and would describe myself as a
Social Democrat.
This means I support policies like: Universal health care, public
education, free university tuition, unemployment benefits, disability
and aged pensions. And I also support increased taxes to pay for these.
I do not follow “the social gospel”. No one gets to heaven by Social
Democratic policies. The only way to heaven is through repentance and
faith in Christ for the forgiveness of sin. Moreover, I do not see
Social Democratic policies as attempting to build “Heaven on Earth. I
do, however, see these policies as making life on earth better. Not
perfect, not a utopia, but just better.
Social Democratic policies are not prescribed in the Bible. But neither
are they proscribed.
Minarchism (the opposite of social democracy) is not prescribed or
proscribed in the Bible either.
The best Bible passages to support Social Democracy are the gleaning
passages in the OT (Leviticus 19.9-10 and Deuteronomy 24.19-22). In
both these passages, Israel’s farmers were commanded to leave the sides
of their fields unreaped so that the poor can get food. This was not
charity. It was a command. And it was a redistribution of property –
goods owned by the rich were transferred to the poor so that they may
have enough to eat. If the Bible was against Social Democratic policies,
such an action would not have been prescribed for God’s Old Covenant
people.
Another passage is Genesis 47.13-22 when God saved Egypt through Joseph.
What occurred was essentially the pharaoh taking over private farms,
which would be an ancient form of nationalisation. If the Bible was
against Social Democratic policies, such an action would not have been
prescribed.
Taxation is not theft. The Bible never depicts it as such. Romans 13.6-7
says that Christians should pay taxes. 1 Samuel 8.10-18 does warn that
kings have the power to steal your property and family for their own
selfish and warlike ends, but we’re not talking kings here, we’re
talking government.
Ancient Rome had a grain dole (the “Cura Annonae”). This was present in
Rome during the first century. It was a law that provided free bread to
the needy. None of the NT writers speak about it negatively. In fact they
don’t mention it at all. This is important because the book of Romans,
written to the Christians in Rome, did not require them to oppose it.
Some social democratic social policies support abortion and
homosexuality. While I adhere to the Bible’s stance on these two issues,
I don’t think that making abortion illegal will result in less
abortions, and I don’t think that making homosexual marriage legal will
result in the destruction of the “traditional family”. There have been
too many myths and rumours surrounding the “homosexual agenda” for many
decades within the evangelical community.
Much of modern evangelical Christianity has been infiltrated by
pro-capitalist thinking over the years, to the point where “the
Christian worldview” ends up denying things like welfare payments or
public education or universal healthcare. This is ridiculous.
The Bible’s overwhelming depiction of poor people is that they are not
responsible for their poverty. While some passages warn against laziness
or idleness, the vast majority of poor people are shown to be poor
because of the actions of the rich. eg Proverbs 13.23, 14.21, 14.31,
19.4, 21.13, 22.22, etc (just search for “poor” in both testaments and
you’ll see the overwhelming message)
Social Democrats are not Socialists. A Socialist wants the government to
control all enterprises and capital. By contrast, a Social Democrat sees
a greater part for government to play in society and the economy. Social
Democrats still see a part for the free market to play in societyand the
economy. They just see the government being involved more. Even Bernie
Sanders isn’t trying to destroy capitalism. He’s just a Social Democrat.
While historical examples of Socialism and Communism have persecuted
religions, atheism and anti-religionism is not essential to their belief
system. Modern day Socialists accept religious freedom, even if they do not
agree with certain religious morals being accepted into wider society.
Social Democrats, similarly, support religious freedom.
It is very possible for individuals, households and even entire
countries to become “better”, and to do so without the work of the Holy
Spirit in regenerating them. Many people become better people without
being saved. This is partly a good thing, as it shows God’s common
grace. But they’re not getting to heaven without Christ. Let the
government and society be the place where God enacts his common grace,
and let the church and Christians be the ones who spread God’s saving
grace. I’m saying this because too many Christians argue that the only
way people’s lives can be changed for the better is through the Gospel.
Of course the Gospel does change lives, and it also secures for those
who have faith in Christ the assurance of eternal life, but there are
plenty of things in our world that have improved people’s lives that
aren’t gospel related.
Well done sir. Even though I am more of a minarchism proponent, I do try to be principled and consistent regardless what political team is in charge. I have enjoyed our discussions and enjoy standing with you on in other posts and forums.
The argument “Oh we should only ever preach the Gospel, that is the only solution” is only true insofar as it is the message from God about salvation and the cure for original sin. But this betrays an over-realised gospel eschatology and creates the concept that the Gospel is simply a “cure all” for any and every bad situation. People who become Christians aren’t all going to magically become sinless, law abiding people here on earth before the return of Jesus.
Then add to this the fact that there ARE things that can be done to improve life here on earth that don’t involve a regeneration by the Holy Spirit. People CAN become better people outside of the direct saving work of God. Of course this “getting better” does not save them or grants them eternal life, but that is not the point. The point is what they can do NOW.
And what are these things? Universal health care, public education, pension and unemployment benefits, social housing, an accountable police force, less guns, the decriminalisation of drugs… the list can go on.
But for whatever reason, Christians oppose these ideas because they are “Socialist” and don’t focus on “personal responsibility” when in fact they oppose them because they don’t want to pay more taxes and have been brainwashed by generations of free-market ideology spread by people like the atheist Ayn Rand and somehow think that “the Christian worldview” is equivalent to minarchism.
I’m a conservative Christian, and I’m also a social democrat from Australia. I also know that there are people who post here who aren’t Social Democrats like me, and would have a problem with some of the policies I’ve mentioned above. And that’s fine… come up with some alternatives that don’t involve the continuation of the status quo and which don’t label social programs as always a failure (because they’re not… I’ve seen them work here in Australia). But whatever you do, don’t somehow argue that minarchism is an inherently Christian ideology. It’s not. Nor is Social democracy, by the way, but that’s the point… I see it as a viable option rather than as a divine command.
(Edit: note that I see Social Democratic policies as helpful in making a better society. I am not trying to create a utopia.)
Some very good thoughts here. I think of myself as a political independent because it doesn’t seem to me as a Christian that I should be beholden to a particular political party or group of politicians. I should be politically engaged (“IN the world”) but should not be pledged to a particular party (“OF the world”). And I tend to be “a la carte” on political issues, where neither main American political party (or minor party for that matter) exactly represents what I think would be my best response a set of issues. On various issues I may be left of center, right of center, etc. I lean left of center more often than right of center, but not always. The complete identification of many evangelicals with a specific political party and political ideology, up and down through its whole platform, and automatically following everything a given politician says and does, is utterly baffling and infuriating to me. They immediately take up and promote and defend whatever position the Republican Party (or, more specifically, President Trump) espouses, as if it is infallible Scripture. And whatever the Democrat Party says or does, they automatically take the opposing view. And so I see Christians demanding strong partisan stances on issues where I would say there is not one single “Christian” response, and also adopting many strong partisan stances that I would argue are anti-Christian. There are segments of the evangelical church that I would argue are no longer a church, but are in fact merely a political action committee using religious language as window dressing.
Agree. This is how I feel about climate change too. The science is 100% clear, and, even if it weren’t, what are the consequences of trying to reduce greenhouse emissions? Less polluted air? Like, how could it be a bad thing even if scientists were being alarmist?
Eventually, I realized that because Democrats are “for it”, Republicans must be “against it”. The well is so thoroughly poisoned that many Republicans feel like anything a Democrats supports must be evil. Even if it doesn’t seem evil, it must be a trick. Then the “logic” works backwards from there. Like, “Why do they want cars to be more efficient? I know, they must be trying to destroy the auto industry!!! And since some car companies are American, that must also mean they hate America.”
I don’t know how you solve this problem, especially since they live in a bubble which tells them to only trust information from inside the bubble.
No, that is just the excuse SOME christians give for not supporting BLM, because they can’t give the real reasons.