Op-ed piece on Fox today from Douglas MacKinnon expressing his fear that soon he may have to go underground in America because he is a Christian. Normally, I wouldn’t give this guy the time of day; he’s the one who once suggested that Southern states should secede from the union because of same-sex marriage, and name their new territory “Reagan.”
To the point of the article, however: MacKinnon is not alone in his belief that Christianity is being oppressed and persecuted here in America. We have had the same concerns expressed here. MacKinnon does the usual conflation of persecution of Christians in the Middle East with the experience of Christians in America, equating the violence over there with Christianity being “mocked, belittled, smeared, and attacked” here in America. He laments that while we are still a majority Christian nation, Christians are fearful of saying “Merry Christmas” anymore, and warns believers that it is only a matter of time before they are attacked for their faith. He suspects this is partly due to the fact that many Americans now associate Christianity with the right in general, and Donald Trump in particular.
As a Christian living in the United States, do you feel attacked? Persecuted? Oppressed?
Honestly, to be afraid of having to go underground as a christian in a country with a majority of christians is just looking for a reason to feel persecuted. Silly silly silly.
It may be…but sometimes it is good to have some early warning flares sent up so we can all be more aware and not let ‘subtle’ signs go unnoticed. Otherwise you wake up one day (not ‘you’ per se), and wonder ‘how the heck did this happen?’
Being a Christian is not something you can or cannot be because a government allows it. Saying Merry Christmas is not something Christians need to fear to say.
God did not give us a spirit of fear and yet so many Christians seem to be preoccupied with hand wringing.
No. No. No. (To all three questions.) But I do have an “However.” Some of the mainstream media is broad-brushing Christianity and presenting our faith in a bizarre kind of rendition. When it is so easy to identify the lies the media is presenting, it is all too easy to wonder, “What else are they lying about, how else are they misinforming us?”
IF some in the media are wanting Christianity to crash and burn and are trying to take it down, the end result of a crash and burn may be the media, not Christianity. The media needs to ease up, not because I feel attacked, persecuted, or oppressed, but because what they are doing is beneath them and I expect better of them. If I don’t get it, they, not the faith, is what I will be ignoring and considering not worthy of note.
How do you think Christianity is being portrayed by the media? I’m asking out of genuine curiosity on my part as to your opinion, not so much as to the nature of the portrayal but its source/perpetuation. In the last several decades what I’ve perceived is that Christianity (and Evangelicalism in particular) has been politicized and aligned closely with the political right, but who created this association in the public’s mind - the media, or the Religious Right/GOP themselves?
Interesting that MacKinnon didnt use the phrase Judeo-Christian.
Is that still valid these days?
The Jews certainly do not have any issues with knowing who their enemies are.
It does depend on the media, some of whom are quite scornful of Christian views of gay marriage, homosexuality, etc. First of all, the majority of Christianity, while acknowledging homosexuality as a sin, have also been the first to look the other way (in a manner of speaking). It was the media who seemed to be on the look-out for fringe elements of Christianity mistreating homosexuals and the presented as standard treatment by Christians.
I’m not just speaking of the news media, but of the Hollywood media as well with their own presentations of conflicts between homosexuals and people of faith. An analogy might be of a barber minding his own business, doing his craft well, and then someone says, “There is Mr. Barber. He scalps people.” Then the poor barber is left to re-educate the masses on his profession and what he does for a living. In the same way the media basically announces, “Those Christians hate and persecute homosexuals,” when the truth is that as a whole we never even gave them a second thought. They were fellow Christians just like the rest of us. But the media hunts until they find at least one who was mistreated and blares their story.
The quiet way most of Christianity has handled homosexuality down through the ages simply doesn’t make good copy. It’s not homosexuality that would cause a major uprising from the faithful. However, the news media with their continual poking just may. But anything for a good story, right?
Has the perception of Christianity been negatively influenced by the way some believers have attempted to use the secular government to enforce their beliefs on non-believers?
Can you give me a specific example of how some believers have attempted to use government to force their beliefs on non-believers? For example, the Catholic Church is open and welcoming towards all. We are not fans of anyone frog-marching non-believers into church–in fact, I’ve never seen that.
Meanwhile I’m wondering why government got itself involved in the marriage business to begin with. Government tendrils are all over the place. I always vote to remove government tendrils, not create more of them. Now government (which means lawyers) has its tendrils in gay unions. When it comes to government, be very careful what you wish for, unless it is for less less government.
Ah…so you are comparing South Africa’s apartheid system to the way that christians are treated in the U.S. Fascinating. And validates what I said about how some christians are just looking for, even inventing ways to feel persecuted.
