GOD-DAMNED HYPOCRITES - PART 2
THE
MEASURE OF A CHRISTIAN
Such individuals employed as public servants find a target rich environment for their vile personalities, and a system designed to conceal and enable their very worst excesses. The damage they can do to victims of crime, predators, systemic failure, and injustice can never be quantified because most of what they do will never be revealed thanks to an absence of real regulation in favour of a policy of cover-up. But every now and then, we get a glimpse of the predators behind the curtain.
On occasion, when the media finds a story so disturbing, unsettling, or reprehensible they believe it will be a highly lucrative, marketable commodity, the general public is made aware of the immoral and unethical behaviours of people who should know better and should be prosecuted. Public outrage lasts only as long as the story trends, and is then forgotten until another, similar story emerges, if it is remembered at all. The behaviours never change because those in positions of authority to ensure it is prevented or deterred fail to do so, or use their influence to protect themselves or friends who are exposed.
Perhaps the most outrageous examples of this perversion of social responsibilities are those found in legal situations, where those providing testimony are required to swear upon the Bible to speak the truth, and the lawyers and judges seem immune to the concept of justice. The victims are badgered, terrorised relentlessly by defence lawyers in an effort to discredit them. Until recently, those accused of domestic violence and rape could cross-examined their victims, using their history of abuse and control to frighten the victim into silence, paint them as unhinged, and get off on the power-trip.
And the judge, who presides over the whole, sordid business (and that’s what it is when a legal outcome is reduced to a commodity and laws, policies and procedures are too often used to circumvent justice), remain silent and allow such abuse of power to continue. Reprimanding victims or grieving relatives for emotional outbursts, or even wearing or carrying images or mementoes of victims under the insistence that a Court is no place for emotion or ‘silent protests’ because they may be prejudicial (even when the accused admits to being, or is found to be, guilty) is despicable. As if the inadequate sentences that fail to penalise or deter a guilty individual for their crimes were not bad enough.
The very idea that the victim has no place in a case unless it is to be depicted as a liar says a lot about what is wrong with our society and why there is serious need for positive change. Christ Himself once said “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them” (Luke 11: 46). Yes, He was speaking to the Pharisees about religious law, but anybody who feels compelled to argue this cannot apply to modern law makers has proved the point of just how rotten their thinking has become.
Our legal system is supposed to be the very pinnacle of justice, a place where those who have it not can come to restore their dignity and those who have transgressed may be held to account. Instead, this place is just another market and the entrenched culture of corruption ensures victims remain isolated and silenced unless they have the funds to purchase a positive legal outcome. Even social and support services are being privatised, reduced to a commodity run at a profit, with all the lowest-bidder and other built-in cost-cutting systemic failures and entrenched culture of corruption this entails. The legal system and our politicians set the example that we all must follow. They hold all the power.
We, the voters, have no real democracy to end it, and the Unions and Churches that should be speaking for the victims of injustice are too busy using the very same reprehensible legal system to silence or defend against the accusations of their own victims of extortion, intimidation, assault, child abuse and rape. Those responsible are, too often, so-called Christians, and worse, they have far too many other so-called Christians who not only say nothing to oppose this abhorrent behaviour, but are just as guilty of committing offences of the same nature and silencing the victims with intimidation and slander.
This is not what Christ told us to do. He told us not to inflict our self-centred ambitions and desires on others. He told us to serve one another and look after those most in need. At no point did He tell us to go out of our way to inflict our idiotic attitudes and opinions on non-Christians, or force them to follow rules that too many ‘Christians’ doing that won’t follow themselves. At no point did He tell us we could break some of the rules for being a Christian and condemn non-Christians for doing the same.
All this time wasted holding up signs and shouting at gay people, women forced by circumstances to have an abortion, drug addicts, the unemployed, widows, orphans, foreigners, refugees, people who support the left-wing of politics, insulting them, intimidating them, telling them God hates them and that they are going to hell. All that hypocrisy, forcing discrimination and injustice on people who have done nothing to deserve that vile hate and, in many cases, needing the help and support of real Christians.
We are told that there are more important issues than marriage equality, than climate change and the threat of global warming that is destroying the Great Barrier Reef and other eco-systems, the refugees including women and children imprisoned illegally in detention centres for years on end, and hundreds of thousands of un- and under- employed citizens living below the poverty line on Welfare or the charity of friends and relatives. That there is no time to waste on those ‘issues’ that are actually problems. That, besides, those people affected or supporting these causes are liars, or evil, bent on destroying our way of life, that there is no problem at all. So what is it that our so-called political representatives believe is more important?
Privatising domestic violence services so a company can profit from the brutalisation and rape of women and children. Fifty-billion-dollar tax cuts for big business while the unemployed and disabled are bullied, terrorised and have their welfare payments cut off or reduced. Cuts to Sunday Penalty rates for low-income workers to increase profit margins for business. An inept Prime Minister out of his depth shouting defamatory accusations at the leader of the ALP that are more a reflection of himself and reveal just how insulated and disconnected he and the LNP have become.
How is it that a society founded upon the modernised combination of Christianity and Greek democracy of a time several thousand years earlier can claim a separation of State and Religious laws when religion has permeated every level of the authority? The opposition to State law concerning equality (be it marriage or gender or even racial) is entirely religious in nature. How is it changes to laws regarding freedom of speech are designed to enable racial vilification and intimidation and yet far too many ‘Christians’ support this in violation of State law that claim to uphold our society’s ideologies?
How can so many voters and politicians can oppose marriage equality and demonstrate bigotry and racism still claim to be Christians? The same hypocrites will rail against Unions that defend the violated rights of the working class, and the very notion of social services like Obamacare for the disadvantaged on grounds that these reek of socialism, something they consider evil despite the fact that Christ was a socialist. Have a look at what happens to the disadvantaged under Capitalism, and you will begin to wonder what so many so-called Christians defend and support it, and how they can blame its victims.
Consider the duties of a Christian. Perhaps it would be of some benefit to sit down and begin to ask yourself some hard questions. Do you consider yourself to be a Christian? Do you follow the teachings of Christ? Do the teachings you follow come from the Bible or are they the directions somebody else has given you? When it really matters, do you choose to do what God asks or what other people want you to do? Do you persecute those who put God first rather than do what you want them to do? Do you inflict your rules on unbelievers and behave as a hypocrite? What kind of example do you set for others? Do you still consider yourself to be a Christian?
Self-centred human desire that is contrary to what God’s wants is what leads to sin. Jesus expects us to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Matthew 22: 37 & Mark 12: 30) but also to “Love your neighbour as yourself” (Matthew 22: 39 & Mark 12: 30), but what does this mean? If we follow the example of Christ, then it means we must lead a life of self-sacrifice. This does not mean that we put the desires of others first, but those of God. If we truly want to demonstrate love then it will be for the long term benefit of our neighbours, not for their short-term human desires which requires us to choose them over God.
Sadly, the crucifixion of Jesus demonstrates the corrupting influence of human desire in the face of true love. Unfortunately, a real Christian can expect similar responses from those they really care about. This does not mean you will be literally crucified, but it will probably mean some form of persecution even at the hands of those who claim to be Christians. The Apostles are good examples of what is expected, the sacrifices they made and the suffering they endured, and Martin Luther is an outstanding example of what a real Christian is when faced with the daunting prospect of rebuking corrupted ‘Christians’.
Many of us have suffered this fate and have watched hypocrisy enabled and rewarded by Church leaders, elders and even the Ministry itself. They may have even demanded we not only remain silent about the hypocrisy, but publicly confess and apologise to those at fault for our “false accusations” and declare our total and unconditional support for the hypocrites. This, we are told, is what real love, what real faith in Jesus Christ, requires.
Our failure to participate in, and enable, the hypocrisy results in being ostracised, defamed and driven from that “Church”. When this happened to me, my faith was, have no doubt, severely shaken, and that particular “Church” is even more corrupt today than it was at the time, the congregation being misled more than ever, some willingly. The warnings of people like myself, and there are many, are ignored because we have been discredited with slanderous accusations that ensure the facts are never revealed. It is this activity that is as destructive to the Churches as the predations of child abusers within the congregations, the entrenched culture of corruption that conceals and enables it by isolating and silencing victims. And it happens in the Churches all over the world, not just in the UK, the US and Australia.
So, what is God’s love? God’s love is the example of love we must follow; God’s love is motivated by a desire to restore the relationship with His lost children to the point that He willingly sacrificed Himself, through His son by telling those lost children what they need to hear (1 Corinthians 13: 4-10). Love is not about enabling sin; love is about doing what is needed even if it means that you suffer for doing what God wants. If a person claims to be a Christian then they will not hesitate to do what God asks rather than enable someone they claim to love by choosing to support their desires before God (Colossians 3: 1-25).
What
is a Christian? This question is considered by many Christians at some point in
their lives. I have, on more than one occasion, usually after being accused by
false Christians of not being a Christian because I refuse to conceal and
enable their hypocrisy. So what is a Christian? Most people think it is someone
who believes in Jesus Christ and/or believes that Jesus Christ died for our
sins so that we might be forgiven and so repair the rift between ourselves and
God. This is correct only on a surface level. Jesus Christ died for us as an
example of the love God has and the sacrifice He willingly made so that we
could be reunited with Him, but despite the idiotic drivel of too many fools,
God’s love is not unconditional: He expects something in return.
What, then, is a Christian? A Christian is somebody who not only accepts that Jesus Christ lived and died to pay the penalty for our sins, but somebody who hears and obeys the teaching given us by Christ and His disciples as detailed in the New Testament. As Christ himself said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it” (Luke 11: 28) and in greater detail in John 14: 15-21 & 23-24. Indeed, you will know a Christian by their actions, and both unbelievers and false Christians by theirs (Titus 1: 16). So what is it that God asks of us and how should Christians behave?
Christ expects us to share (by example or preaching, or prophesy, if you will) His Gospel, telling others of His life and teachings so that they, too, may be blessed with His Grace and receive God’s forgiveness. Christ expects us to follow His example and, in so doing, set an example to others of how a Christian should behave so that they may see the differences between God’s people and those who are lost. Christ expects us to share in fellowship, thereby providing support for one another and ensure that nobody strays to preach false teachings or set bad examples that are contrary to what Christ taught us.
What, then, is a Christian? A Christian is somebody who not only accepts that Jesus Christ lived and died to pay the penalty for our sins, but somebody who hears and obeys the teaching given us by Christ and His disciples as detailed in the New Testament. As Christ himself said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it” (Luke 11: 28) and in greater detail in John 14: 15-21 & 23-24. Indeed, you will know a Christian by their actions, and both unbelievers and false Christians by theirs (Titus 1: 16). So what is it that God asks of us and how should Christians behave?
Christ expects us to share (by example or preaching, or prophesy, if you will) His Gospel, telling others of His life and teachings so that they, too, may be blessed with His Grace and receive God’s forgiveness. Christ expects us to follow His example and, in so doing, set an example to others of how a Christian should behave so that they may see the differences between God’s people and those who are lost. Christ expects us to share in fellowship, thereby providing support for one another and ensure that nobody strays to preach false teachings or set bad examples that are contrary to what Christ taught us.
But not everyone has the courage, ability or opportunity to speak openly about their faith. Some simply live their lives without others ever knowing they identify as a Christian at all. The fear of isolation, loneliness and persecution is just too much to bear. It is only by their behaviour that we have any hint at all that they are a Christian. And then there are those who lay claim to being a Christian and yet their behaviour indicates otherwise. The liars, thieves, bullies, domestic violence inflicting, child raping and murdering trash that are all too willing to inflict the very opposite of what Christ instructed.
Then
there is that grey area. That place where people who claim to be Christians
behave badly yet justify what they do using interpretations of the Bible they
know or refuse to accept are wrong, or just because they are horrible people.
Read the responses to any news report on social media about domestic violence,
refugees fleeing war or persecution in the Middle East, the unemployed,
low-income workers and penalty rates and you’ll find some of the worst excuses
for humanity unleashing the idiotic opinions of their flawed personalities for
no other reason than they believe it is their right to be an arsehole.
And if only it was limited to the kind of trash that
have nothing better to do with their time than terrorise better people on
social media, hiding behind the anonymity of the internet because they are too
gutless to come out into the public arena and behave that way in a place where
they could be arrested or humiliated in turn on social media. Sadly, the
entrenched culture of corruption is not limited to the ill-educated, bigoted,
ignorant and just plain intellectually deficient in places that don’t really
matter: those people managed to get jobs in places where their stupidity can
cause serious harm.
Such individuals employed as public servants find a target rich environment for their vile personalities, and a system designed to conceal and enable their very worst excesses. The damage they can do to victims of crime, predators, systemic failure, and injustice can never be quantified because most of what they do will never be revealed thanks to an absence of real regulation in favour of a policy of cover-up. But every now and then, we get a glimpse of the predators behind the curtain.
On occasion, when the media finds a story so disturbing, unsettling, or reprehensible they believe it will be a highly lucrative, marketable commodity, the general public is made aware of the immoral and unethical behaviours of people who should know better and should be prosecuted. Public outrage lasts only as long as the story trends, and is then forgotten until another, similar story emerges, if it is remembered at all. The behaviours never change because those in positions of authority to ensure it is prevented or deterred fail to do so, or use their influence to protect themselves or friends who are exposed.
Perhaps the most outrageous examples of this perversion of social responsibilities are those found in legal situations, where those providing testimony are required to swear upon the Bible to speak the truth, and the lawyers and judges seem immune to the concept of justice. The victims are badgered, terrorised relentlessly by defence lawyers in an effort to discredit them. Until recently, those accused of domestic violence and rape could cross-examined their victims, using their history of abuse and control to frighten the victim into silence, paint them as unhinged, and get off on the power-trip.
And the judge, who presides over the whole, sordid business (and that’s what it is when a legal outcome is reduced to a commodity and laws, policies and procedures are too often used to circumvent justice), remain silent and allow such abuse of power to continue. Reprimanding victims or grieving relatives for emotional outbursts, or even wearing or carrying images or mementoes of victims under the insistence that a Court is no place for emotion or ‘silent protests’ because they may be prejudicial (even when the accused admits to being, or is found to be, guilty) is despicable. As if the inadequate sentences that fail to penalise or deter a guilty individual for their crimes were not bad enough.
The very idea that the victim has no place in a case unless it is to be depicted as a liar says a lot about what is wrong with our society and why there is serious need for positive change. Christ Himself once said “And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them” (Luke 11: 46). Yes, He was speaking to the Pharisees about religious law, but anybody who feels compelled to argue this cannot apply to modern law makers has proved the point of just how rotten their thinking has become.
Our legal system is supposed to be the very pinnacle of justice, a place where those who have it not can come to restore their dignity and those who have transgressed may be held to account. Instead, this place is just another market and the entrenched culture of corruption ensures victims remain isolated and silenced unless they have the funds to purchase a positive legal outcome. Even social and support services are being privatised, reduced to a commodity run at a profit, with all the lowest-bidder and other built-in cost-cutting systemic failures and entrenched culture of corruption this entails. The legal system and our politicians set the example that we all must follow. They hold all the power.
We, the voters, have no real democracy to end it, and the Unions and Churches that should be speaking for the victims of injustice are too busy using the very same reprehensible legal system to silence or defend against the accusations of their own victims of extortion, intimidation, assault, child abuse and rape. Those responsible are, too often, so-called Christians, and worse, they have far too many other so-called Christians who not only say nothing to oppose this abhorrent behaviour, but are just as guilty of committing offences of the same nature and silencing the victims with intimidation and slander.
This is not what Christ told us to do. He told us not to inflict our self-centred ambitions and desires on others. He told us to serve one another and look after those most in need. At no point did He tell us to go out of our way to inflict our idiotic attitudes and opinions on non-Christians, or force them to follow rules that too many ‘Christians’ doing that won’t follow themselves. At no point did He tell us we could break some of the rules for being a Christian and condemn non-Christians for doing the same.
All this time wasted holding up signs and shouting at gay people, women forced by circumstances to have an abortion, drug addicts, the unemployed, widows, orphans, foreigners, refugees, people who support the left-wing of politics, insulting them, intimidating them, telling them God hates them and that they are going to hell. All that hypocrisy, forcing discrimination and injustice on people who have done nothing to deserve that vile hate and, in many cases, needing the help and support of real Christians.
We are told that there are more important issues than marriage equality, than climate change and the threat of global warming that is destroying the Great Barrier Reef and other eco-systems, the refugees including women and children imprisoned illegally in detention centres for years on end, and hundreds of thousands of un- and under- employed citizens living below the poverty line on Welfare or the charity of friends and relatives. That there is no time to waste on those ‘issues’ that are actually problems. That, besides, those people affected or supporting these causes are liars, or evil, bent on destroying our way of life, that there is no problem at all. So what is it that our so-called political representatives believe is more important?
Privatising domestic violence services so a company can profit from the brutalisation and rape of women and children. Fifty-billion-dollar tax cuts for big business while the unemployed and disabled are bullied, terrorised and have their welfare payments cut off or reduced. Cuts to Sunday Penalty rates for low-income workers to increase profit margins for business. An inept Prime Minister out of his depth shouting defamatory accusations at the leader of the ALP that are more a reflection of himself and reveal just how insulated and disconnected he and the LNP have become.
How is it that a society founded upon the modernised combination of Christianity and Greek democracy of a time several thousand years earlier can claim a separation of State and Religious laws when religion has permeated every level of the authority? The opposition to State law concerning equality (be it marriage or gender or even racial) is entirely religious in nature. How is it changes to laws regarding freedom of speech are designed to enable racial vilification and intimidation and yet far too many ‘Christians’ support this in violation of State law that claim to uphold our society’s ideologies?
How can so many voters and politicians can oppose marriage equality and demonstrate bigotry and racism still claim to be Christians? The same hypocrites will rail against Unions that defend the violated rights of the working class, and the very notion of social services like Obamacare for the disadvantaged on grounds that these reek of socialism, something they consider evil despite the fact that Christ was a socialist. Have a look at what happens to the disadvantaged under Capitalism, and you will begin to wonder what so many so-called Christians defend and support it, and how they can blame its victims.
Consider the duties of a Christian. Perhaps it would be of some benefit to sit down and begin to ask yourself some hard questions. Do you consider yourself to be a Christian? Do you follow the teachings of Christ? Do the teachings you follow come from the Bible or are they the directions somebody else has given you? When it really matters, do you choose to do what God asks or what other people want you to do? Do you persecute those who put God first rather than do what you want them to do? Do you inflict your rules on unbelievers and behave as a hypocrite? What kind of example do you set for others? Do you still consider yourself to be a Christian?
GOD’S
LOVE
According to the New Testament, God’s love is so great
that He sent His only son, Jesus Christ, to die for our sins. Jesus Christ, who
is one with God and has His power, walked among us and told us what we needed to hear. He did not tell us what
we wanted to hear. Even as He was
tempted in the desert by the devil and was offered the fulfilment of every
earthly desire, Jesus saw the bigger picture and responded “Worship the Lord
your God, and serve him only” (Matthew 4: 10) because He knew that what God
wants is more important than human desire.
Self-centred human desire that is contrary to what God’s wants is what leads to sin. Jesus expects us to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Matthew 22: 37 & Mark 12: 30) but also to “Love your neighbour as yourself” (Matthew 22: 39 & Mark 12: 30), but what does this mean? If we follow the example of Christ, then it means we must lead a life of self-sacrifice. This does not mean that we put the desires of others first, but those of God. If we truly want to demonstrate love then it will be for the long term benefit of our neighbours, not for their short-term human desires which requires us to choose them over God.
Sadly, the crucifixion of Jesus demonstrates the corrupting influence of human desire in the face of true love. Unfortunately, a real Christian can expect similar responses from those they really care about. This does not mean you will be literally crucified, but it will probably mean some form of persecution even at the hands of those who claim to be Christians. The Apostles are good examples of what is expected, the sacrifices they made and the suffering they endured, and Martin Luther is an outstanding example of what a real Christian is when faced with the daunting prospect of rebuking corrupted ‘Christians’.
Many of us have suffered this fate and have watched hypocrisy enabled and rewarded by Church leaders, elders and even the Ministry itself. They may have even demanded we not only remain silent about the hypocrisy, but publicly confess and apologise to those at fault for our “false accusations” and declare our total and unconditional support for the hypocrites. This, we are told, is what real love, what real faith in Jesus Christ, requires.
Our failure to participate in, and enable, the hypocrisy results in being ostracised, defamed and driven from that “Church”. When this happened to me, my faith was, have no doubt, severely shaken, and that particular “Church” is even more corrupt today than it was at the time, the congregation being misled more than ever, some willingly. The warnings of people like myself, and there are many, are ignored because we have been discredited with slanderous accusations that ensure the facts are never revealed. It is this activity that is as destructive to the Churches as the predations of child abusers within the congregations, the entrenched culture of corruption that conceals and enables it by isolating and silencing victims. And it happens in the Churches all over the world, not just in the UK, the US and Australia.
So, what is God’s love? God’s love is the example of love we must follow; God’s love is motivated by a desire to restore the relationship with His lost children to the point that He willingly sacrificed Himself, through His son by telling those lost children what they need to hear (1 Corinthians 13: 4-10). Love is not about enabling sin; love is about doing what is needed even if it means that you suffer for doing what God wants. If a person claims to be a Christian then they will not hesitate to do what God asks rather than enable someone they claim to love by choosing to support their desires before God (Colossians 3: 1-25).
Comments
Post a Comment