06-29-2016, 08:15 AM
(06-28-2016, 11:40 PM)radind Wrote:(06-28-2016, 09:21 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Religious liberty sounds like the apotheosis of tolerance. But religious freedom does not invariably produce Quaker-like gentleness. It can also produce the Westboro Baptist Church (associated with the infamous site godh@tesf@gs.com) and -- as in Iraq and Syria, which had some religious pluralism, ISIS.There are problems in many religions and the Westboro Baptist Church does not fit my concept of a Christian group. In my opinion a Christian church with a Biblical worldview would not behave in such a horrible way. you can always find bad examples of any group you want to look at.
It still comes down to individual responsibility and accountability.
Which is like denying that the Sicilian Mafia is Italian. It may be grossly unrepresentative of Italian-American life; to be sure, most Italian-Americans want no ties to the Mob. They would rather live like characters in Moonstruck than in Goodfellas. If this sounds like a harsh judgment of criminals of a certain origin, then think of the worst criminal syndicate that ever existed.
I have much German ancestry, and I do not look for relatives in Germany after about 1870 in my genealogy. If I don't want a connection to Frank and Jesse James (another part), then I don't want one to Hermann Goering. Someone born with my mother's not-very common maiden name was a Hungarian war criminal in Yugoslavia, duly executed by Tito's people for mass murder after the war.
Westboro Baptist Church claims to have Biblical justification for its hatred of homosexuality. "Love thy neighbor as thyself" seems to contradict the theatrical gay-bashing of that group. There were churches that taught that slavery was a marvelous tool for bringing people to Jesus as (literal!) captive audiences for the Gospel. In a fascistic America, as in Nazi Germany, there would be churches that kiss up to a tyrant. But this all ties in to the contradiction of "Love thy neighbor as thyself".
Responsibility and accountability are essential to any Good Life. Without those one at best gets away with doing horrible things to others. Without responsibility and accountability, then life is a zero-sum game at its worst.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.