The liberal war on women of faith
It’s one thing to support or oppose a government policy; it’s quite another to attack individuals personally who disagree or to find excuse to drag them into court. Two recent incidents illustrate the point.
Start with Karen Pence, the vice president’s wife. She’s incurred liberal media wrath by daring to resume teaching art part time at a private school. Take a look at liberal reactions:
—The American Civil Liberties Union says she’s sending “a terrible message to students.”
—The left-wing Guardian sees in Mrs. Pence a reminder of “the vice-president’s dangerous bigotry.”
—Noted theologian Lady Gaga told fans that what Mrs. Pence has done confirms she and her husband are “the worst representation of what it means to be Christian.”
—CNN host John King believes that what Mrs. Pence has done warrants removing her Secret Service security protection.
—Lois Romano, a former Washington Post editor and senior writer for Politico tweeted: “How can this happen in America?”
Romano’s question is mine as well. What outrage has Karen Pence committed to merit the media’s venom?
Like most conservative Christians, the Pences believe that same-sex marriage is morally wrong. The private school at which she teaches requires an employment contract that among other provisions, states: “I understand that the term ‘marriage’ has only one meaning: the uniting of one man and one woman in a single, exclusive covenant union as delineated in Scripture.”
Those who run the Immanuel Christian School know that they and those who think like them are on the defensive in America’s culture war. All they ask is to be allowed, within the confines of their community, to uphold 2,000 years of Christian teaching on gender, marriage, and sexuality.
The Pences affiliate with a church and a school that interpret the Bible literally. Neither they nor the school trash-talk same-sex marriage supporters. They are not accused of insulting or bad-mouthing homosexuals or same-sex couples.
How can liberals praise diversity in one breath and yet in their next breath attack any individual who dares to deviate even slightly from their narrow-minded groupthink? Ask Joe Biden.
For liberals, it wasn’t enough for the Supreme Court to legalize same-sex marriage. Any who still don’t agree must be compelled to abandon their fundamental beliefs even when they take no action that threatens others.
That intolerant mindset is on display again as the left renews its attack on another mortal threat to the liberal way of life: Denver’s Little Sisters of the Poor.
The nonprofit law firm Becket reports:
“The Little Sisters of the Poor will be in court to ask for protection from a lawsuit by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra threatening their religious ministry. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will hear arguments in California v. Little Sisters of the Poor and decide if California and… other states can force Catholic nuns to provide services such as the week-after pill in their health care plan in violation of their faith.
“In 2017, following an Executive Order, a five-year legal battle resulting in a Supreme Court victory, and a new HHS rule protecting religious non-profits, the Little Sisters finally received a religious exemption that applies to non-profits nationwide. Yet California immediately sued the federal government to take that exemption away. Joined now by 12 other states and the District of Columbia, Attorney General Becerra is forcing the Little Sisters back to court to defend their hard-earned religious protection.”
Quoting Romano once more, “How can this happen in America,” and for the Little Sisters, now the second time around?
In their relentless march to the left, Democrats have relied on the Supreme Court to legislate from the bench for decades. But now they are unwilling to accept a clear Supreme Court decision defining a religious exemption from birth control mandates for nonprofits.
The Little Sisters regard human life as beginning at conception and ask only not be forced to participate in ending nascent life with abortifacients. Their employees fully understand that contraceptives and abortifacients will not be included in their health insurance coverage.
None of this is acceptable to liberals. Anyone guilty of failing to fully embrace and actively support their preferred lifestyles is by their definition a hater and a bigot.
They see religion as a convenient cover for discrimination. Like Karl Marx, they believe that it’s “the opium of the people.” Hence religion must be evicted from the public square and, if possible, from people’s minds.
It’s getting harder and harder to defend religion — any religion — from the left’s relentless assaults. This despite religious freedom being the first freedom specified in the Bill of Rights.
I support religious freedom, religious diversity, and the freedom to have no religion at all.
The viewpoints expressed above are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The Independent.
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The abortion argument and gay marriage are both hot button topics. But that is primarily because fanatical, piously correct, moral relativists, like yourself Howie, are constantly bringing them up. Want to live a quiet peaceful existence? Try minding your own f*%#ing business for a change. LGBT people don’t want to make you gay. Pro-choice people don’t want to force you to have an abortion. And I seriously doubt that either situation has any meaningful impact on your own personal life. Any good psychologist will tell you that those that can’t control their own emotions must try to control the behavior of others. Maybe Christians should stop trying to make everyone else do only what they think is “right;” because that road leads to Gilead.
Neil, your comment makes the point of my column exactly. Karen Pence and the Little Sisters want nothing more than “to live a quiet peaceful existence.” They’d like the liberal media to “Try minding [its] own…business for a change.” Neither I nor they said anything derogatory about gays or those seeking abortions nor do any of us “try to control the behavior of others.” Look in the mirror, Neil: You’re the one who apparently is “trying to make everyone else do only what [you] think is ‘right.'” As I said in my opening sentence, “It’s one thing to support or oppose a government policy; it’s quite another to attack individuals personally who disagree.”
Howie what I find distasteful is your constant dogmatic propagandizing. You never start with the facts and follow them to the truth. Instead you cherry pick information that will let you support the ideological beliefs that you already hold. And you do it in public so all of the people that have been indoctrinated to believe the same lies you do will feel empowered to keep believing them. BTW, what did you think of Trump’s 4th of July speech? Still think he’s a “stable genius?”
Howard is as predictable as the sun rising.
Worship demagogues, lather, rinse, repeat. Blame someone else when he gets soap in his eyes. This is why people can’t stand those who identify with the right.
“Noted theologian Lady Gaga” – That had me laughing so hard! Great article Howard! It is easy to be “tolerant” and “inclusive” of people we agree with. Loving your enemy and doing good to those that despitefully use you is not easy. Hopefully both sides will learn to practice what they preach when they say everyone deserves respect.
Nothing but cherry-picked propaganda and shameless playing the victim rhetoric. Your de-evolution is nearly complete, Howard. Are your knuckles dragging on the ground yet?
mojave rat, you fall into the same trap that Neil does: making an ad hominem attack on me personally. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ad%20hominem
Your ad hominem attacks are in the same vein as those made by the media that I highlighted in my column. They all reflect their respective author’s inability or unwillingness to support their own position and instead to resort to schoolyard insults. There certainly are good arguments supporting both same sex marriage and abortion, but you, Neil and the media instead stoop to attacking those with whom you disagree rather than making those arguments.
Please re-read my column and recognize that I did not criticize or argue against either same sex marriage or abortion. Instead, I noted that, in Neil’s words, these folks asked only to “live a quiet peaceful existence.” Ask yourself why you, Neil and the media are unwilling to leave these people alone. Is their very existence somehow a threat? Really?
Both of our comments were more directed at your long term behavior Howie, not the contents of this one article. You do the same thing week after week. Cherry pick some insignificant event out of the week’s news and inflate it into another reason for those on the right to hate the left, and those on the left to hate those on the right. You are doing nothing to improve anything. Quite to the contrary. You’re making things worse. But go ahead and keep analyzing the tree and pretending the forest doesn’t exist. That’s why St George News gave you the boot.
Cry me a river, Howard.
You do absolutely nothing but pick subjects that you know are hot-button issues and then you weaponize them. You are a walking talking DOG WHISTLE for people on the right who allow themselves to be angered by the dumbest things. Poor picked on Trump… poor picked on Pence… poor picked on Pence’s “mother”… socialism = BAD… fascism = GOOD… and on and on and on ad nauseam.
Almost every single thing you present here is ALL about how bad the left is. How anti-American they are, how unpatriotic, how socialist, how BIG government they are. Aside from your rant against the Lake Powell pipeline, everything you have to say is negative and disrespectful. We get it, you hate people on the left. It’s that obvious. *snore*
You are nothing but a byproduct of a belief system that continues to fill your head full of lies. Do you honestly expect us to take you seriously and respect your opinion when you type such drivel? Why do you think you get so much crap? It’s because we know better. We see through your lies. And your propaganda stinks so bad it needs to go out with the garbage.
Wake up, Howard. WAKE !! UP !!