Re: [asa] Advice for conversing with YECs (Christian nation?)

Bernie, while I also think that America was not a 'Christian nation' in a
simple sense (though the Christian influence and involvement with America's
founding is both real and complex), are you really going to ride this
particular horse into the ground? Especially when 'give me liberty or give
me death' clearly wasn't spoken in a slave context, 'No king but king Jesus'
was another cry, the reason for obedience and mercy was vastly more than
'because Jesus is coming back', and so on.

On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 1:47 PM, Dehler, Bernie <bernie.dehler@intel.com>wrote:

> If we were ever a "Christian nation" then it must be some kind of
> "Christian" that is defined differently from the Bible. A rallying cry for
> independence was "give me liberty or give me death," which is opposite what
> the Bible teaches.
>
> We are not of this world, and we are to live as "strangers" and "aliens" in
> it... as "ambassadors for Christ," representing a different kingdom... not a
> kingdom of the Earth. Also, more specifically:
>
> 1 Peter 2:11
> Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain
> from sinful desires, which war against your soul.
>
> 2 Corinthians 5:20
> We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal
> through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God.
>
> Even slaves should obey their masters, not revolt for freedom:
>
> Ephesians 6:5
> Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity
> of heart, just as you would obey Christ.
>
> Ephesians 6:9
> And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since
> you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there
> is no favoritism with him.
>
> Colossians 3:22
> Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when
> their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and
> reverence for the Lord.
>
> Titus 2:9
> Teach slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please
> them, not to talk back to them,
>
> 1 Peter 2:18
> Slaves, submit yourselves to your masters with all respect, not only to
> those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are harsh.
>
> The reason we are not to rebel is because the time is short... this world
> is passing away (very, very soon), and God will make everything new...
> according to the Bible.
>
> ...Bernie
> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
> Behalf Of Ted Davis
> Sent: Monday, November 03, 2008 9:29 AM
> To: James Patterson; asa@calvin.edu
> Subject: RE: [asa] Advice for conversing with YECs - attn John
>
> I want to reply briefly to James' important concerns about church/state
> "separation" and the origins controversy.
>
> I won't repeat (yet again) the details of my own view (searching the ASA
> archives will bring out several of my old posts) that the currently
> received
> interpretation of the First Amendment, in terms of a Jeffersonian "wall of
> separation between church and state," is not justified. What I will repeat
> here, briefly, is my opinion as a scholar of this issue, that the currently
> received interpretation substantially shapes this issue, though it does not
> drive it. (What drives are theological and biblical objections to
> "evolution," and James has already indicated that this is true for him.) I
> will also repeat my belief that a fundamental injustice is being done to
> parents and families whose values are undercut (in their view) by the
> monopolistic nature of public education, on this particular issue. I've
> voiced those views in various other venues as well, even in my review of
> Ken
> Miller's "Finding Darwin's God" for the NCSE journal and in my review of
> some ID books for Christian Century a decade ago. As long as this
> situation
> continues--which is to say, IMO, as long as I will be alive--the
> controversy
> about origins and public education will not go away.
>
> As for this country being "founded by Christians for Christians," (to
> borrow James' words), however, I do not agree. Did the framers intend for
> various types of Christianity (such as Catholicism in Maryland or Calvinism
> in Massachusetts or Quakers in Pennsylvania) to flourish, without
> interference from the federal government? Absolutely, yes. The bottom
> line, for them, was religious freedom--but this also definitely included
> the
> freedom not to be religious, or to believe (as Jefferson and Franklin did)
> that "reason" made Christianity untenable. We shouldn't forget that Thomas
> Paine, whose pamphlets helped incite the revolution, was also a
> "freethinker" who said scandalous things about the Bible. The very idea of
> disestablishment (which clearly *is* the point of the First Amendment,
> whatever one may say about Jefferson's "wall") originated in a severely
> persecuted minority--the Anabaptists, who denied the validity of either a
> state church (Luther's Germany or Henry's England) or a church state
> (Calvin's Geneva) -- and was then secularized by Enlightenment philosophers
> in France and Scotland. That minority was not considered to be genuinely
> Christian by many of the Lutherans, Catholics, and Calvinists who
> persecuted
> them.
>
> What the founders of the various colonies wanted, James, was freedom to
> practice *their particular forms* of Christianity without state
> interference. They did not generally want to see other forms of
> Christianity (which to them were often not genuinely Christian) flourish.
> The framers of the Constitution at least did seem to want that, but they
> also ensured that deniers of Christianity (such as deists and unitarians
> and
> even the occasional real atheist) would also be just as free as they were
> to
> freedom of conscience and religious practice (or non-practice).
>
> Nor do I blame Darwin (as James does) for the deterioration of public
> education. It's easy to invoke Darwin's name for a multitude of sins, but
> I'd much rather see people identify specific problems and talk about
> specific solutions. If "naturalism" is the problem, e.g., then you might
> as
> well blame almost every scientist (Christian or not) there is, starting
> with
> all of that atheism going on at places like NASA and NOAA, where I never
> see
> "God" invoked as part of the explanation for next week's weather or next
> month's satellite launch.
>
> Ted
>
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Received on Mon Nov 3 16:01:01 2008