It would seem that...
What I find ridiculous is the notion that Abortion-on-Demand is a given within the Democratic party, that it is a non-negotiable. Why is that? Why must the Dems maintain a license to abortion and infanticide?
Also ridiculous is that view that if you are a new citizen from Uruguay, voting in the U.S. for the first time and are opposed to abortion, that this makes you a "Republican party operative."
Why can't the Dems ever just say no to their barbaric Bolshevist base who demands unrestricted abortion as a non-negotiable? If a Dem candidate who was solidly pro-Life and had an otherwise reasonable record ever appeared on the scene, I'd seriously consider voting for her . . . and campaigning for her!
If a Dem candidate who was solidly pro-Life and had an otherwise reasonable record ever appeared on the scene, I'd seriously consider voting for her . . . and campaigning for her!
I would too - at least in concept. I'll listen to anyone who is pro-life. Maybe a pro-life Dem could make some headway against abortion that no Republican could.
In practicality, I would have to ask why such a person thought they had enough in common with the Dem party standards to remain in that party. Not that all of the Democratic ideals and notions are wrong. It is just that most of the ones that are not wrong also have a number of middle-of-the-road or rightwards Republicans favoring them also, so that it is usually possible to hold those opinions and serve as a Republican, and then you don't have to fight tooth and nail the Dem lock-step abortion wing to even get a serious hearing.
Bolshevist base
And this lends credence to your opposition to abortion how exactly?
We have this followed by nonsense of voting for a Democrat if yada, yada, yada, but still claiming to be an impartial person.
I never have cared and never will care for absolutists. ;-) More seriously, delusions of autonomy are entertaining but in the end delusions. Absent from the bishop's column and much of the commentary is this whole idea that we have to work with these people tomorrow. We are a two-party state. You'd better be able to work with both parties or your agenda will be marginalized. Certainly, one can be upset by decisions, but our interests don't end yesterday or today; we have to work with these folks tomorrow.
I almost wrote a satirical post along the lines of "Commentators Blast Divisive Criticism of Herod's Massacre of Infants," then remembered Tom's earlier posts about ridicule.
Again, I can understand disagreement about whether the invite is appropriate, what I have trouble with is this effort to mark all criticism of it as illegitimate.
Badger referred to " . . .nonsense of voting for a Democrat if yada, yada, yada, but still claiming to be an impartial person."
I didn't say I was impartial; I am highly partial toward candidates who will work to discourage adults from destroying infants. I am not particularly partisan - which is quite different. Theoretically a solidly pro-Life candidate might be Republican, Democrat, Independent, Green, Whig, Tory, Monarchist, what have you. I wouldn't care which; if s/he were solidly pro-Life, I would take a second look. (The reason for the omission of Bolshevist or Communist from my list is known to any student of history: Bolshevists and Communists in every land have uniformly supported for abortion.)
Badger added: "I never have cared and never will care for absolutists."
I very much hope that you aren't telling us that you envision fairly usual* circumstances under which the practices of animal vivisection, slavery, and torture would be morally jusitifiable? Most of the regulars on this blog are absolutely opposed to each of these, as we are absolutely opposed to the murder of infants in the womb.
*(Usual circumstances would certainly not include the case of a handful of survivors in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust, or of swim ashore a deserted island after a plane crash, an alien invasion, . . . etc. "Usual" meaning nothing outre'.)
If you will pardon me for saying so, there are plenty of things you have to be absolutely against to qualify as a civilized and decent human being. You and I may differ somewhat as to the qualifying list of things to be against; but if you deny that it is possible to be a civilized man and absolutely against nothing at all, then I would conclude that you and I have a very different understanding about what a civilized human being is.
Badger further wrote: "We have to work with these people tomorrow. We are a two-party state. You'd better be able to work with both parties or your agenda will be marginalized."
I think I am less interested in "working with" persons who are devoted to the notion that destroying infants in the womb is a "right" to be protected by all legal means necessary, than I am interested in "working for" these persons' conversion to Christ.
But you must do what you feel called to do; and I shall do what I feel called to do. Thank you.
If you will pardon me for saying so, there are plenty of things you have to be absolutely against to qualify as a civilized and decent human being.
People who say they are against absolutism need a conscience transplant.
The ;-) emoticon obviously wasn't sufficient to communicate the irony of the statement preceding it.
I think I am less interested in "working with" persons who are devoted to the notion that destroying infants in the womb is a "right" to be protected by all legal means necessary, than I am interested in "working for" these persons' conversion to Christ.
Your interest isn't of concern to me. Much like family, being a member of a society is a cooperative enterprise and who you must tolerate is beyond your control.
Communists have not everywhere supported abortion. Romania immediately comes to mind.
Your interest isn't of concern to me.
Being obnoxious while arguing for the need to get along with people is more irony, right?
Obnoxious? Your blog. Goodbye.
For the record, virtually all Communist regimes (wtih some rare exceptions, such as Romania, and also the USSR during a period in the 1930s) have most emphatically supported abortion. The exceptions were attributable to disastrously low birthrates in the country and era in question.
The default setting of all other Communist regimes on abortion is "High on the list of Priorities".
The Bolshevist party (1918) was the first party in all the world to include the right to abortion in its party platform.
Historically, Communism and support for legalized abortion have gone together like a horse and carriage.
For the record, yes, for one blog commenter to comment that another blog commenter's interest isn't of concern to him is obnoxious. It might even scandalize the weak into replying that what concerns the unconcerned commenter is not of interest.
"for one blog commenter to comment that another blog commenter's interest isn't of concern to him is obnoxious"
It might also suggest that the first commenter is much more interested in shutting down an ongoing conversation than in pursuing it.
Which is an interest very much contrary to the spirit of - among lots of other things - this blog.
Though it should be said I can be capricious -- even obnoxiously so -- about shutting down conversations commenters want to start that I don't want started here.
Dolt! Doofus! Dunderhead! that I am! Why did I respond to Badger as I did instead of as I should have to this comment: "Much like family, being a member of a society is a cooperative enterprise and who you must tolerate is beyond your control."
The response I should have given:
"As a disciple of Jesus, I am not called to tolerate my neighbor.
I am called to love my neighbor."
I am thinking of one of my brothers whom I will call Skip. Skip treated our mother badly, very badly over a long period of time. We knew what Skip was doing was wrong; Mom and we all talked to Skip about it, and tried to help him see, but he never seemed able to change.
When we all gathered around her during her final hours, Skip was there. Our dying mother's smile for Skip was as sweet as that she gave the others; her eyes lingered on Skip as long as they did on the rest. She squeezed his hand as she did ours when he took his turn to hold it. Mom never gave up on Skip, but loved him to the last. Even though there was no glossing over the wrong things he had done.
So, too, must be our love for our neighbors who are promoting a culture of sin and death - a love that doesn't gloss over the truth, but that hopes, that doesn't give up, that remains kind and sweet, even in the face of wrong.
Oh, Tom, why do you know me? I'm a dolt. Dolt. Dolt. Dolt.
Dolt!
Absent from the bishop's column and much of the commentary is this whole idea that we have to work with these people tomorrow.
Although I don't agree with Badger's tactics, his comment does have a hidden point. Although it is false that we "have to work with" these people in any close sense, it IS true that tolerating their pernicious, gravely wrong error is better than civil war. If it weren't better than civil war, then at some point we would become obligated to express our disagreement in that most complete fashion, and stop even sort of tolerating them. Given that at least so far we are not trying to oppose them with all possible methods including force, we ARE trying to continue to maintain a civil society with them in our midst.
This all leads to a point I have long thought needs to be made: there is a huge difference between respecting a person (and his right to come to the truth through the integrity of his own mind), and respecting the errors that he has come up with. We don't have to respect the notion that abortion is a civil right, no matter how many people hold that notion. We do have to respect those people.
Tony wrote, "Although it is false that we 'have to work with' these people in any close sense, it IS true that tolerating their pernicious, gravely wrong error is better than civil war."
Is it?
Is to speak the truth, and be hated for it, and to speak it again, and yet again to speak it . . . is this the same as "to tolerate" evil?
For the Christian, is the opposite of "tolerating evil" to attempt to obliterate one's enemy, to humiliate and to destroy him?
I think not.
It would seem that for the Christian the opposite of "tolerating evil" is to suffer for speaking the truth to evildoers and all else who listen.
As Saint John the Baptist did.
"Woe unto them who call evil good, and good evil!"
As Our Lord Jesus Christ did.
Remember, those who hate the truth and love death, must "tolerate" us speaking the truth, as well. And they don't like it, no they don't! As Herod didn't like it, as the Pharisees didn't like it, as Pontius Pilate didn't like it.
Tony added: "There is a huge difference between respecting a person (and his right to come to the truth through the integrity of his own mind), and respecting the errors that he has come up with. We don't have to respect the notion that abortion is a civil right, no matter how many people hold that notion. We do have to respect those people."
As Christians our highest duty is to love and respect our neighbor for the love of God. This means that no matter what my neighbor gets up to, I love him, because my love for him is not about him or who he is, it is about God and who God is. God fills the heart of the Christian to overflowing with His own love, and that love washes down and floods over onto the neighbor, whoever he may be - sinner, righteous, reprobate, or upright - God rains down His love on the just and the unjust. So must we, too, do the same.
Saint Thomas says that to love means to desire the other person's highest good. So if I love someone, I desire the fulfillment of the highest good for them. As a Christian, I know that my neighbor's good is not sin and death, and there's no use pretending that it is. The Christian doesn't "respect" sin and death.
When I respect someone who has embraced sin and death, I don't pretend the sin and death they have embraced is something other than sin and death - that would be to call evil good, and good evil, and therefore woe to me! - No, I remind them that they are too good and lovable to settle for the sin and death they have chosen.
That's what "not tolerating evil" while yet respecting the person consists of: Telling my neighbor that he is too good for the evil he has settled for. That he can do better; that he owes it to himself to do better. Not by force, not by command, but by telling the truth.
~~~
Commenting by HaloScan
