Christians Being Persecuted/discriminated Against In The Usa

[Anastasia13]

People are arrested, beaten, and killed, because they go to church, read a Bible, don't quite follow a state religion. In Turkey, People are sometimes treated differently on the street because they have a Christian name instead of a Muslim name. In China, they could only go to a state Church. In North Korea, you don't go to church. In Saudi Arabia, you can't bring a Bible with you. Freedom of conscience for us also means freedom of conscience for those who do not agree with us.

 

http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/hate-crime/2012/topic-pages/incidents-and-offenses/incidentsandoffenses_final

 

Religious Bias

Hate crimes motivated by religious bias accounted for 1,166 offenses reported by law enforcement. A breakdown of the bias motivation of religious-biased offenses showed:

• 59.7 percent were anti-Jewish.
• 12.8 percent were anti-Islamic.
• 7.6 percent were anti-multiple religions, group.
• 6.8 percent were anti-Catholic.
• 2.9 percent were anti-Protestant.
• 1.0 percent were anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc.
• 9. 2 percent were anti-other (unspecified) religion. (Based on Table 1.)

Of course I do believe we are discriminated against in ways that aren't simply contraception, abortion, or gay marriage. But those most Christians don't seem to care about, like when the media mocks our God as the butt of a joke. God help them if it was Allah or Mohammad though.

Edited May 1, 2014 by Light and Truth

[NotreDame]

Right. Because believing in the dissolution of private capital and the state is silly, unlike believing that one weekly eats the flesh of their once dead man-God.

 

It's the believing that marxism has anything to do with dissolution of the state that's silly.  It's quite effective, however, at dissolving property rights for 99.99% of it's population.

 

I bet the people who lived in feudalism mocked the possibility of the dissolution of their economic order as well.

Ignoratio elenchi ^^^
 

[CrossCuT]

Of course I do believe we are discriminated against in ways that aren't simply contraception, abortion, or gay marriage. But those most Christians don't seem to care about, like when the media mocks our God as the butt of a joke. God help them if it was Allah or Mohammad though.

 

*facepalm* 

[KnightofChrist]

*facepalm* 

 

 

No.
 

[CrossCuT]

No.
 

 

Dont you "No" me, mister!

 

[Luigi]

 

Your analogy is manifestly absurd! Nobody is being forced to use contraceptives.

Right - no one is being forced to use contraceptives. But we are being forced to pay for other people to kill their children. And that violates my religious beliefs just as much as eating pork violates other people's religious beliefs.  

[CrossCuT]

You already pay for that stuff anyway including abortions but people arent boycotting that. 

This is one of those things where you are not held at fault for getting insurance that includes a contraceptive option. Contraception is mostly free anyways so I dont think including it on plans will cause an increase of use. Besides, people who dont use it will continue you to not use it just like people who have used it without it being on their plan will continue to use it now that its part of a plan. etc

[John Ryan]

It's the believing that marxism has anything to do with dissolution of the state that's silly.  It's quite effective, however, at dissolving property rights for 99.99% of it's population.

 

Yours is a boorish reading of history. The problem with Marxism has been that the worst group, Marxist-Leninism was able to take power in 1917 and then recreate itself around the world. All other Communist groups were then made in the image of Lenin and Stalin. Karl Kautsky, the successor to Friedrich Engels, has a pretty good history of this in his Social Democracy vs. Communism. 

 

I am also not convinced that communism is any less bloody than capitalism in history. Capitalism has a demonic history of murder, poverty, starvation and general misery. The difference is that the textbooks we learn from in school do not positions these horrors, such as colonialism with its genocides, as evils of capitalism. Capitalism has a 400 year history bathed in blood. 

 

Right - no one is being forced to use contraceptives. But we are being forced to pay for other people to kill their children. And that violates my religious beliefs just as much as eating pork violates other people's religious beliefs.  

 

And I am being forced to pay for tanks, bombs and planes that kill people which violates my religion. How is that any different? 

Edited May 2, 2014 by John Ryan

[CrossCuT]

And I am being forced to pay for tanks, bombs and planes that kill people which violates my religion. How is that any different? 

I also oppose the murder of innocent people with the tanks, guns, and bombs that I help fund. Revolt.

[KnightofChrist]

ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
ON THEIR "AD LIMINA" VISIT

Dear Brother Bishops,
 
I greet all of you with fraternal affection and I pray that this pilgrimage of spiritual renewal and deepened communion will confirm you in faith and commitment to your task as Pastors of the Church in the United States of America. As you know, it is my intention in the course of this year to reflect with you on some of the spiritual and cultural challenges of the new evangelization.
 
One of the most memorable aspects of my Pastoral Visit to the United States was the opportunity it afforded me to reflect on America’s historical experience of religious freedom, and specifically the relationship between religion and culture. At the heart of every culture, whether perceived or not, is a consensus about the nature of reality and the moral good, and thus about the conditions for human flourishing. In America, that consensus, as enshrined in your nation’s founding documents, was grounded in a worldview shaped not only by faith but a commitment to certain ethical principles deriving from nature and nature’s God. Today that consensus has eroded significantly in the face of powerful new cultural currents which are not only directly opposed to core moral teachings of the Judeo-Christian tradition, but increasingly hostile to Christianity as such.
 
For her part, the Church in the United States is called, in season and out of season, to proclaim a Gospel which not only proposes unchanging moral truths but proposes them precisely as the key to human happiness and social prospering (cf. Gaudium et Spes, 10). To the extent that some current cultural trends contain elements that would curtail the proclamation of these truths, whether constricting it within the limits of a merely scientific rationality, or suppressing it in the name of political power or majority rule, they represent a threat not just to Christian faith, but also to humanity itself and to the deepest truth about our being and ultimate vocation, our relationship to God. When a culture attempts to suppress the dimension of ultimate mystery, and to close the doors to transcendent truth, it inevitably becomes impoverished and falls prey, as the late Pope John Paul II so clearly saw, to reductionist and totalitarian readings of the human person and the nature of society.
 
With her long tradition of respect for the right relationship between faith and reason, the Church has a critical role to play in countering cultural currents which, on the basis of an extreme individualism, seek to promote notions of freedom detached from moral truth. Our tradition does not speak from blind faith, but from a rational perspective which links our commitment to building an authentically just, humane and prosperous society to our ultimate assurance that the cosmos is possessed of an inner logic accessible to human reasoning. The Church’s defense of a moral reasoning based on the natural law is grounded on her conviction that this law is not a threat to our freedom, but rather a “language” which enables us to understand ourselves and the truth of our being, and so to shape a more just and humane world. She thus proposes her moral teaching as a message not of constraint but of liberation, and as the basis for building a secure future.
 
The Church’s witness, then, is of its nature public: she seeks to convince by proposing rational arguments in the public square. The legitimate separation of Church and State cannot be taken to mean that the Church must be silent on certain issues, nor that the State may choose not to engage, or be engaged by, the voices of committed believers in determining the values which will shape the future of the nation.
 
In the light of these considerations, it is imperative that the entire Catholic community in the United States come to realize the grave threats to the Church’s public moral witness presented by a radical secularism which finds increasing expression in the political and cultural spheres. The seriousness of these threats needs to be clearly appreciated at every level of ecclesial life. Of particular concern are certain attempts being made to limit that most cherished of American freedoms, the freedom of religion. Many of you have pointed out that concerted efforts have been made to deny the right of conscientious objection on the part of Catholic individuals and institutions with regard to cooperation in intrinsically evil practices. Others have spoken to me of a worrying tendency to reduce religious freedom to mere freedom of worship without guarantees of respect for freedom of conscience.
 
Here once more we see the need for an engaged, articulate and well-formed Catholic laity endowed with a strong critical sense vis-à-vis the dominant culture and with the courage to counter a reductive secularism which would delegitimize the Church’s participation in public debate about the issues which are determining the future of American society. The preparation of committed lay leaders and the presentation of a convincing articulation of the Christian vision of man and society remain a primary task of the Church in your country; as essential components of the new evangelization, these concerns must shape the vision and goals of catechetical programs at every level.

In this regard, I would mention with appreciation your efforts to maintain contacts with Catholics involved in political life and to help them understand their personal responsibility to offer public witness to their faith, especially with regard to the great moral issues of our time: respect for God’s gift of life, the protection of human dignity and the promotion of authentic human rights. As the Council noted, and I wished to reiterate during my Pastoral Visit, respect for the just autonomy of the secular sphere must also take into consideration the truth that there is no realm of worldly affairs which can be withdrawn from the Creator and his dominion (cf.Gaudium et Spes, 36). There can be no doubt that a more consistent witness on the part of America’s Catholics to their deepest convictions would make a major contribution to the renewal of society as a whole.
 
Dear Brother Bishops, in these brief remarks I have wished to touch upon some of the pressing issues which you face in your service to the Gospel and their significance for the evangelization of American culture. No one who looks at these issues realistically can ignore the genuine difficulties which the Church encounters at the present moment. Yet in faith we can take heart from the growing awareness of the need to preserve a civil order clearly rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition, as well as from the promise offered by a new generation of Catholics whose experience and convictions will have a decisive role in renewing the Church’s presence and witness in American society. The hope which these “signs of the times” give us is itself a reason to renew our efforts to mobilize the intellectual and moral resources of the entire Catholic community in the service of the evangelization of American culture and the building of the civilization of love. With great affection I commend all of you, and the flock entrusted to your care, to the prayers of Mary, Mother of Hope, and cordially impart my Apostolic Blessing as a pledge of grace and peace in Jesus Christ our Lord.

[John Ryan]

In the light of these considerations, it is imperative that the entire Catholic community in the United States come to realize the grave threats to the Church’s public moral witness presented by a radical secularism which finds increasing expression in the political and cultural spheres. The seriousness of these threats needs to be clearly appreciated at every level of ecclesial life. Of particular concern are certain attempts being made to limit that most cherished of American freedoms, the freedom of religion. Many of you have pointed out that concerted efforts have been made to deny the right of conscientious objection on the part of Catholic individuals and institutions with regard to cooperation in intrinsically evil practices. Others have spoken to me of a worrying tendency to reduce religious freedom to mere freedom of worship without guarantees of respect for freedom of conscience.

 

 

 

While I sympathize with the Holy Father, I understand the position of the State in this regard. We live in a diverse country and the State has to enact valid secular policy. I could understand exemptions for Catholic employees who want to opt out of it. However, it does not seem fair to the employees of a Catholic university like Fordham to deny their access to birth-control. What about the rights of those employees who are now being discriminated against?

[Socrates]

I was not even judging the policy one way or another. I am actually anti-Statist. I am a Marxist Communist who believes in the dissolution of private property and its guarantor, the State. However, we do live in a liberal democracy and under the rules of the game, I think the contraceptive mandate makes perfect sense. I also think it makes perfect sense in a liberal democracy for the Government to compel me to give tax dollars to fund the behemoth war machine. That has been the extent of my argument. 

 

I am not a social anarchist, however. I do think that the community has the right to violate the conscience of people. So, for example, I am sure you do not agree that a religion which advocates pedophilia should be respected or allowed to exploit children. Oftentimes, political policies violate somebody's freedom of conscience. I understand the need for contraceptives and I understand that certain Catholics do not want to be responsible for providing them. In the system of private property, I personally side with the contraceptive mandate. I think the need for contraceptives outweighs conscience claims, in a system where employees are dependent for healthcare on the capitalist class. This would be so easy to solve in a rational socialist system. Nobody would be forced to produce contraceptives and those that do would distribute them based on need. That is, society could provide needed contraceptives and those who believe them to be immoral would not have to participate in them whatsoever. Money, as a mediating moment, gets in the way of everything. I say lets abolish Mammon, the Mark of the Beast.

 

Okay, so you're a self-professed Marxist Communist who believes not only in the moral acceptability of contraceptives, but that that others (Catholics) must be forced to violate their Faith and conscience to help pay for them, and their supply somehow overrides freedom of religious practice.  Groovy.

 

As the Catholic Church has repeatedly, strongly, and unambiguously condemned Marxist socialism (and all other forms of socialism), as well as contraception (just read your Catechism), you could at least show some basic honesty and remove the misleading label "Catholic" from your profile.

 

As Pope Pius XI said in his encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, "No one can be at the same time a sincere Catholic and a true socialist."

 

 

That said, it was not "the community" that dictated that the very real community of persons in Catholic college I mentioned to change their insurance policies against their will to cover contraceptives and abortifacient drugs (none of the administration, employees, or students support it - I can speak from personal knowledge), but politicians and bureaucrats far away in Washington, D.C. offices (what normal people would consider "the State.")

 

Of course, while claiming in academic theory to reject the state, in reality you and other leftist Marxists in reality support the unbridled expansion of the state's power to do whatever is necessary to crush those who stand in the way of your utopian fantasy.

 

Just as Marxist Communist regimes have constantly done throughout Marxist Communism's murderous, oppressive, and tyrannical history.

 

And I'm not an anarchist either, but comparing providing insurance plans that don't cover contraception to pedophiliac rape in order to justify this trampling of religious liberty is simply ridiculous and insane - and displays the utterly warped and sick moral thinking at the heart of leftism.

 

And while I don't really give two poos about "liberal democracy" (whatever exactly that means), I do know that in a Constitutional Republic, as ours was founded to be, this is an outrage - as Congress is supposed to obey the limits set forth by the Constitution that was supposed to be the law of our land.

 

Socialism can burn in hell with Karl Marx.

[Socrates]

I am also not convinced that communism is any less bloody than capitalism in history. 

 

I'm convinced you are profoundly ignorant of history.

 

http://reason.com/blog/2013/03/13/communism-killed-94m-in-20th-century

[4588686]

Okay, so you're a self-professed Marxist Communist who believes not only in the moral acceptability of contraceptives, but that that others (Catholics) must be forced to violate their Faith and conscience to help pay for them, and their supply somehow overrides freedom of religious practice.  Groovy.

 

As the Catholic Church has repeatedly, strongly, and unambiguously condemned Marxist socialism (and all other forms of socialism), as well as contraception (just read your Catechism), you could at least show some basic honesty and remove the misleading label "Catholic" from your profile.

 

As Pope Pius XI said in his encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, "No one can be at the same time a sincere Catholic and a true socialist."

 

 

That said, it was not "the community" that dictated that the very real community of persons in Catholic college I mentioned to change their insurance policies against their will to cover contraceptives and abortifacient drugs (none of the administration, employees, or students support it - I can speak from personal knowledge), but politicians and bureaucrats far away in Washington, D.C. offices (what normal people would consider "the State.")

 

Of course, while claiming in academic theory to reject the state, in reality you and other leftist Marxists in reality support the unbridled expansion of the state's power to do whatever is necessary to crush those who stand in the way of your utopian fantasy.

 

Just as Marxist Communist regimes have constantly done throughout Marxist Communism's murderous, oppressive, and tyrannical history.

 

And I'm not an anarchist either, but comparing providing insurance plans that don't cover contraception to pedophiliac rape in order to justify this trampling of religious liberty is simply ridiculous and insane - and displays the utterly warped and sick moral thinking at the heart of leftism.

 

And while I don't really give two poos about "liberal democracy" (whatever exactly that means), I do know that in a Constitutional Republic, as ours was founded to be, this is an outrage - as Congress is supposed to obey the limits set forth by the Constitution that was supposed to be the law of our land.

 

Socialism can burn in hell with Karl Marx.

 

No, leftist movements have consistently been involved in issues like police brutality, imperialist wars, the defense industrial complex, structural racism, and other actually violent facets of the modern state.  Your only sincere and substantive objections to state power seem to focus of those aspects of the state which involve providing marginal assistance to the poor.  One of the many reasons that your brand of conservatism is contemptible. 

 

 

[Socrates]

No, leftist movements have consistently been involved in issues like police brutality, imperialist wars, the defense industrial complex, structural racism, and other actually violent facets of the modern state. 

 

Leftists only oppose state power when they're not the ones in power.

 

Leftist regimes have been responsible for more murder and oppression in history than any other.

 

 Your only sincere and substantive objections to state power seem to focus of those aspects of the state which involve providing marginal assistance to the poor.  One of the many reasons that your brand of conservatism is contemptible.

 

 

Your face is contemptible.