Why Christians get a raw deal

You may have noticed a lot of anti-Christian sentiment these days.  The reason for this, not surprisingly, is the behavior of many Christians.  It is said that Gandhi once said “I like your Christ.  I do not like your Christians.  They are so unlike your Christ.”  Religion in general and Christianity specifically can be a wonderful thing, or a very ugly thing.

I’ll start out with two well known Freds.  First we have the notorious Fred Phelps, pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, KS.  This is a group that insists that America is doomed because of its acceptance of homosexuals, among other things.  They often protest funerals of soldiers with signs such as “Thank god for dead soldiers.”  They are using religion as a vessel of hatred, which is not at all what I gather the message of Jesus was.  Naturally this is an over the top and thankfully rare example, and perhaps they are only trolling for lawsuits (many in the family are attorneys) but I have a feeling that Jesus wouldn’t applaud them.

Jesus was a man who, in his own words, pretty much said that forgiving others is not only a good idea, it’s mandatory.  Matthew 6:14-15 reads “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.”  And really, how else would we determine the message of Jesus other than his own words?  

Jesus was also suspiciously silent on the subject of homosexuality.  Sure it is touched on a bit in the Old Testament, but if god so hated homosexuals, you’d think he would have instructed his son to really drive that point home in his teachings.  And even if it is a sin, remember that part where he said you must forgive?  

Another Fred you’ve probably heard of is Fred Rogers, famous for his role as Mr. Rogers.  Mr. Rogers was a man of deep religious conviction.  You may not have known this, as he was never one to go around thumping others with a bible, especially not during his children’s show on PBS.  He was an ordained Presbyterian minister.  

Mr. Rogers followed what I believe is the true message of Jesus.  He chose to use his faith to do a great service to children everywhere.  Not once did he convey a religious message, he simply taught children lessons about everyday life and made sure that they knew that they were special and each and every one of them had worth.  I think if Jesus saw his works, his reaction would be two thumbs up.

Mr. Rogers was so passionate about what he did that he testified before congress regarding funding for PBS as well as keeping the VCR available so that children could watch his shows at any time.  Truly a man that any faith and the irreligious alike should respect and admire.

There are many out there much like Fred Rogers, but very few get recognition.  The media has a bias toward the story that sells.  For every Islamic radical that flies a plane into a building, there are thousands using Islam’s 5 fundamental pillars to do great works.  I read recently about a man in Cairo who frequently sets out a feast in the street for all who are hungry.  His faith compels him to do this in the name of charity.  You will not hear about him or his kindness via a CNN breaking news bulletin.

Likewise when a Christian bombs an abortion clinic, it makes the headlines.  When a Christian church sets up a soup kitchen to feed the homeless, it does not prompt a Fox News Alert.  I believe that people of faith as well as the irreligious are generally good, the very few that aren’t are simply the ones that get the most attention.  

I don’t believe much of the backlash against Christians in the United States has to do with terrorism, it’s just not that common.  I believe most of it comes from the fact that many Christians aren’t content in having their own faith.  Many insist on budding into the lives of others, mostly through government.

Take gay marriage, for example.  Marriage can be defined by the church however it wants to define it.  Churches have the option to refuse to perform homosexual wedding ceremonies, nobody wants to take that right away from them or force them to participate in anything they believe is morally wrong.

Marriage as a legal instrument, however, is merely an exclusive contract entered into by two natural persons.  To deny one to enter into that contract based on gender is nothing short of discrimination.  I’m actually quite surprised that the courts haven’t demanded homosexual marriage be permitted on the grounds of equal protection.

There is no compelling reason whatsoever to prohibit homosexuals from marrying.  Religious groups, however, insist on lobbying for its prohibition based on what I believe are misguided religious reasons.  That tends to rub a lot of people the wrong way.  Certainly homosexuals, but also the ever growing number of people such as myself who are not homosexuals but fully support equal rights for them.

To us, what you’re essentially saying is “I don’t want other people to be happy, I want to stand in their way because the bible says homosexuality is a sin.”  Do these people not read their bible or something?  Deuteronomy 32:35 reads To me belongeth vengeance and recompence; their foot shall slide in due time: for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them make haste.  God pretty much tells you that it isn’t your business to judge.  Matthew 7 begins with Judge not, that ye be not judged.  It doesn’t seem as though Jesus would want the church involved in the government either.  Matthew 22:21 reads Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's.

It’s not unlike anti-sodomy laws, trying to codify their moral values into law.  I have some news for them, the average person doesn’t care what consenting adults do behind closed doors.  Maybe two guys want to have sex.  Maybe they want to bring a midget in.  Perhaps they want to dress in duck costumes.  If they are all consenting adults, what business is it of anyone other than the consenting parties?  As long as it’s behind closed doors, after all, such a law couldn’t effectively be enforced anyway.

For a group of people so opposed to homosexuality, the Catholic church sex abuse scandal delivers a bit of irony.  I’m not sure that generates a lot of anti-Christian sentiment but it certainly doesn’t make them look good.  It isn’t something that’s uniquely Christian, that sort of abuse and cover up can happen in any organization, as evidenced by the recent scandal at Penn State.

Then there are the Christians who aren’t content with teaching creationism in the church.  Instead they insist on teaching creationism along side with evolution or even in place of evolution (if they had their way) in schools.  Most of us (including many Christians) believe that school is a place for science, not faith.

On that note, I’m not sure why some Christians are compelled to believe that creationism and evolution can’t both simultaneously exist.  The Bible says that god created the universe, but it doesn’t go into great detail as to how.  Sure there’s the whole 7 days if you really want to take that literally, but there’s no reason not to believe that god created the universe and the system by which evolution would take place and lead to man.  

So-called young earth creationists believe that the Earth is 6000 years old, but that number doesn’t appear in the bible.  It was determined by an Archbishop in 1634.  Many biblical scholars disagree with his conclusion.  Some cite other numbers, while others believe that it can’t be determined.

The overreaction to persecution that doesn’t exist also drums up a lot of anti-Christian sentiment.  Despite what some will tell you, there is no war on Christmas.  If a company drafts a policy to say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas”, they are not doing this as an affront to your faith.  They are doing this for the same reason a company does anything, it’s a business decision.  They feel that the more inclusive terminology will be more pleasant to non-Christians.  It’s not an attack, it’s a decision made in a board room based solely on their bottom line.

I’m not sure how much of the distaste for Christianity comes from the door knockers or those passing out leaflets (as Mitch Hedberg said, it’s like they are saying “Here, YOU throw this away.”)  Such intrusions can be annoying, but politely declining is always an option that ends the encounter at once.

This is only going to apply to a few Christian sects, but most people have a strong distaste for those who would withhold medical care from their children on religious grounds.  Some sects will not accept a life saving blood transfusion, others will not get vaccines.  It’s one thing if an adult makes this choice, but to force it on an innocent child, well that’s where personally I would draw the line when it comes to religious freedom, but that’s just my opinion.

Refusing medical care on religious grounds never made any sense to me.  I’m reminded of an old parable told in the church I grew up in and probably countless other churches around the world.  A man is on his roof during a flood and a boat comes by to save him.  He waves them off saying “Oh no, god will save me.”  Two more boats come by and with each he waves them off, insisting that god will save him.  He drowns.  He meets god and asks why he didn’t save him.  God said “I sent three boats!”  When one is praying for healing, perhaps god sends skilled doctors and other medical professionals to handle it.

A good deal of the ire probably comes from the issue of abortion.  Many on the Christian right would say that most abortions are performed for convenience.  While I don’t doubt that may happen, I suspect that very few fall into that category.  Abortion is a very unfortunate choice made by women in very unfortunate situations.  Perhaps Christians would be better served trying to attack the social problems that lead to abortions being necessary in the first place.  Of course some churches even oppose birth control, which is one of the biggest things out there that could make fewer abortions necessary in the first place.

Many Christians tend to pick and choose the parts of the Bible that they like, often the ones that reinforce their political views or other opinions on things.  Too many like to quote the Old Testament while ignoring the message of Jesus Christ.  If I’m not mistaken, Jesus Christ is the central figure in Christianity.  Why do so many fail to follow his own teachings?  I’d guess it’s because they are self-serving people with a lot of hatred in their hearts and little capacity for empathy.

These are all fair criticisms of the actions of some Christians, and people have a tendency to paint with a broad brush.  I can tell you from personal experience that not all Christians are like that.  There are plenty who choose to have faith quietly in their church and lead a humble, loving life and bring joy and peace to others.  They just don’t make a lot of noise.

It’s no different than it is with atheists.  Foaming at the mouth combative atheists make all the noise and give them a bad rap as well, while your average everyday atheist just goes about their own life, just as your average everyday Christian does.  

In any case, the world would be a lot better if we had more Fred Rogers and fewer Fred Phelps.

A tribute to Andy Rooney

Did you ever notice that you don't see feathers very often?  Now and then I'll be on a walk in the park or in the forest and I'll see one, but it's a fairly rare things to see.  Why is that?  There are plenty of birds flying around all day, you'd think feathers would be as common as leaves on the ground.

Why are the poor so poor?

If you're poor in the United States you effectively have a big target on your back. Some have described the whole thing as a `poor tax', which is a fairry apt analogy. I'm not talking about the homeless or infirmed, I'm talking about the working poor. Men, women, families living on the fringes just trying to make it by. Nobody makes it easy for them.

It isn't illegal to be poor per se. Furthermore there isn't some grand conspiracy to keep the poor where they are. Or perhaps there is, if you want to count banks and the government as the conspirators. In any case, the system in place makes it very difficult to be poor.

If you're poor in this country, you may be living in section 8 housing, which charges only what they deem you can afford. If not, you may be spending half of every dollar you earn paying a bank or a landlord for a place to live. That's a nice chunk of change right off the bat. Unless you want to live in a tent city of a hippie commune, housing is a very pricy commodity in many parts of the country.

Many municipalities don't make it easy to be poor either. One typical community in Pennsylvania had sewage installed a few years ago. Residents already had perfectly working septic systems, but sewage became mandatory. If you didn't pay the rather expensive tap-in fee and pay someone to dig a line to the sewer, they would shut your water off and threaten liens on your property. This was a town full of senior citizens on fixed income and people living well below the poverty line taking advantage of what used to be a rock bottom cost of living. I sometimes wonder if they could force you to have electricity at a house. Not that I would ever want to be without it, but I wonder how far they go.

Many municipalities aren't satisfied with mandatory utilities, instead sending code enforcers out and about to write up fines for any number of nonsensical `violations'. Now I understand correcting things that affect the safety and health of the public, we can't have people out there with garbage piling up attracting animals or dangerous buildings threatening to fall into the street, but these are far more innocuous things like having a broken down car in sight or having a broken window.

No matter what your lot in life, banks are just something most of us have to deal with on a regular basis. Before backing off it it under heavy pressure, Bank of America famously unveiled a $5 monthly fee for people using their debit card. It didn't go over well, but it goes to show how banks operate. There are also naturally overdraft fees for those who spend more than they have. You might guess these such fees affect the poor disproportionately, and according to a recent FDIC finding that is the case, also estimating that overdraft fees made up as much as 74% of all revenue from bank fees in 2006.

Due to recent changes in the law, consumers must now opt in to overdraft `protection', the banks like to make it out as if they're doing consumers a huge favor, after all who knows what emergency could come up? But the truth is, it's a ploy to attempt to get those barely scraping by into a cascade of overdraft fees resulting in huge gains for banks at the expense of some of the poorest people. Another handy little trick of theirs is posting things to the account in order of largest to smallest. Say you have a balance of only $100 and you buy $99 worth of groceries then 5 more small purchases of $5. Regardless of the order in which you made the purchases, the largest one is deducted first, ensuring additional overdraft fees. For low income consumers, this could eat up half of their next paycheck. Naturally it also makes them likely to overdraw the account again, after all even the poor have to eat. Now to be fair, many banks will agree to remove SOME overdraft fees if it was a one time deal, but they are under no obligation to do so.

Some people simply can't afford to pay that kind of money, so they just write it off. Well that's where Chexsystems, Telecheck and other such companies come into play. They keep a record of who has been a victim of a bank and make sure that they can't get another checking account. That's not entirely true, there are alternatives out there, but it makes dealing with any convenient large bank impossible. So they're stuck going to check cashing places and paying a fee just to get their hands on their own money.

Of course you could always take out a payday loan to cover it. At 4000% APR (no, that's the correct amount of zeroes, though they are usually very short term loans) it amounts to financial rape, but some people are taken in by the prospect of $1,500 overnight. Then they get their next check and a few hundred on top of that to pay off the interest, next thing you know they're in need of another one. These of course target the poor. Do you think middle class folks would even consider for one moment something so usurious? I can assure you, we would not. Get hungry enough though and I suppose anything can seem alluring.

Another good scam the banks have going is the student loan system. Now I'm not saying that every student loan is a scam, some people do use such loans to get an education and a lucritive job that allows them to pay the loan back and enjoy a high quality of living. Some, however, are basically hoodwinked into getting a useless degree (or not even finishing school at all) and are tied to crippling debt for a very long time with absolutely nothing to show for it. Harassing collections agencies are easy enough to dispatch or simply ignore, but the debt itself is nearly impossible to shake, whether or not you actually received a useful education as a result.

Banks also offer credit to many. They act as if they are doing you a favor for this, and in some cases they are. Low interest loans provided to those with good income and a good credit history can be the right move in some cases, particularly on a mortgage or automotive installment loan. Don't expect to get a good interest rate if you're poor or have bad credit, however.

Often the poor are relagated to buying used cars from `buy here pay here' places. Shorter term loans with very high interest rates are the norm in that industry. And of course these being used cars and the poor being, well poor, disaster could strike at any minute. No worries, they'll just repossess the car, fix it up and sell it again to someone else. Quite a nice little niche, isn't it?

And then there's health care. What do you do if you're poor and have no insurance? Other than the obvious bootstrappy things, best bet is to go to the ER and simply not pay the bill. Not because you don't want to, because you simply can't. That cost is than absorbed by those of us who do have insurance or can pay, and often leads to personal bankruptcy. So informally, emergency health care is available to all, but as a practical matter preventative care is,like many things, out of reach for the poor. Since dental care is almost never an emergency matter, you can forget about caring for your teeth if you're poor.

As the cost of health care for those who can not afford it is already absorbed by those who can, you might think that making it official and streamlining the process would be in everyone's interest. You dirty socialist, you. That's commie talk right there! Other nations have decided that health care is a basic human right and part of the social contract between the government and its citizens. We're not having any of that here.

Sure there are programs out there, and they do help a lot. Most are for children, even those who can't muster a basic level of empathy for most tend to at least care a bit for the welfare of children, or at least pretend that they do. But don't fool yourself, you're basically screwed in the health care department here unless your employer has such benefits of you happen to inherit a lot of money.

Naturally when bills don't get paid, they get assigned or sold to collection agencies. I could write an entire essay on that subject alone. They lie, they mislead, they make threats they can't possibly take action on. When they do actually sue, they often don't have any paperwork that can demonstrate that the debtor owes them money. It's a very common practice to file a mountain of lawsuits knowing that most of the debtors won't even show up, then they get a default judgment.

With a judgment in hand, there are all sorts of legal remedies to involuntarily take money from the debtor. In some states, wages can be garnished. Elsewhere they can essentially raid a debtor's bank account. Should people pay their bills? Absolutely. Put yourself in someone else's shoes, however. Say a single mother who decided to get her kids much needed vaccinations instead of paying her Sears card. Years later after a default judgment, some attorney takes every cent out of her bank account, and now she can't afford any groceries. She can't ever get ahead enough to even afford to pay an attorney to file for bankruptcy. To those who would say "just pay your bills", have you not a shred of empathy?

Our culture of consumerism is no help either, nor are the advertisers. Children are bombarded with ads for expensive toys, people are led to believe that your worth as a person is based on what sort of vehicle you drive, even if you have to go heavily into debt to get it. Perhaps many adults can overcome that and realize that they can't afford the finer things in life, but they also have to explain to their children that they simply can't have the toys that they want for Christmas.

So they should stop being poor, right? From all of the poorest people I've met I can tell you from firsthand experience, they aren't poor because they're lazy. They're poor because the system keeps them poor. I'm not arguing for equal outcome in this country, but you're fooling yourself if we have anything even near equal opportunity.

Meanwhile CEO's of failed companies get million dollar bonuses. Is it any wonder why people are occupying this and that these days in protest? The only thing that continues to surprise me is the number of people who are actually defending the rich through this all. I don't mean the rich people defending themselves, that's quite understandable, I mean very poor people defending the rich. Perhaps it's because the right wing has lumped its pro-rich policy in with wedge issues such as abortion, perhaps it's because they expect to be rich some day and would rather pay lower tax rates. Perhaps they simply listen to too much talk radio. Whatever the case, it boggles the mind.

My recommendation to them would be to spend a few days with someone in the working poor class. Don't worry, they don't really smell like sour milk and they probably won't try to take your wallet. They work as hard as any of us, many work much harder for a pittance. If you think it's their fault they're poor, you're naive. If you think the rich deserve to be where they are, you're a fool. If you think things will ever change, you have far more hope than I do in this country.

Hey look, another blog.

I haven't taken a crack at this other than my blog of regional interest that no one reads ever, but hey if there's one thing the world doesn't have enough of, it's blogs, right?  So I figure I'll give it a go.  Perhaps I'll post some of my essays here, perhaps I'll post photos of my dog or at least I would if I had a dog.  Perhaps I'll get a follower or two some day.  Time will tell. 

So in light of me launching this super awesome blog that you're just going to LOVE, please spam all of your facebook or twitter friends or whatever the kids are on about these days with all of my posts, they'll just love it, trust me.

Worst first blog post ever?  Time will tell.