Scary Stuff

NRO: Real Venom On The Left Against Conservative Christians

(National Review Online) 
Meanwhile, asHarper's levels vicious attacks on conservative Christians, the California assembly has passed a bill designed to prevent politicians from using "anti-gay rhetoric" in their political campaigns. Opposition to same-sex marriage itself is considered by many to be "anti-gay." So has public opposition to same-sex marriage been legislatively banned? As a secular American, I don't personally see homosexuality as sinful. Like many Americans, I welcome the increased social tolerance for homosexuality we've seen since the 1950s. Yet it's outrageous to ban political speech by Christians who do sincerely understand homosexuality to be a sin.

Along with the move toward same-sex marriage in Scandinavia and Canada, we've seen systematic efforts to criminalize and silence expressions of the traditional Christian understanding of homosexuality. We've been told that the American tradition of free speech will prevent that sort of abuse here. Yet now, California's battle for same-sex marriage is calling forth legislation that takes us way too far down the path toward banning the expression of traditional Christian views. While Harper's is spinning out fantasies of a Christian theocracy, the California state legislature gives us the reality of a secular autocracy.

The companion piece to the Hedges article inHarper's is a long report by Jeffrey Sharlet on Christian conservatives in Colorado. Sharlet notes the conviction of these Christians that they're being turned into "outcasts in their own land." He treats the notion that traditional Christians need to flee the urban centers of Blue America as a paranoid fantasy. Well, California's latest attempt to control political speech shows the fears are real. And what happens to traditional Christians who refuse to flee the cities? King's College, a quality Christian school that's decided to move from the countryside to the heart of New York City, is about to be destroyed by the New York State Board of Regents. It's hard to see in this move anything other than anti-Christian bias.

Conservative Christians have good reason to fear cultural ostracism. The mere expression of their core religious views is being legislated against. The courts have banned traditional morality as a basis for law and have turned instead to secular Europe for guidance. Traditional Christians can't even set up a college in New York City. And now Harper's is calling them evil fascists. Yes, conservative Christians have the ear of the president and of the Republican leadership -- you bet they do. Given the way they're being treated in the culture at large, they'd be fools not to protect themselves by turning to politics.

Yet traditional Christians are playing defense, not offense. Harper's speaks of a "new militant Christianity." But if Christians are increasingly bold and political, they've been forced into that mode by 40 years of revolutionary social reforms. David Brooks has already explained how Roe v. Wade unnecessarily polarized the country, making it impossible for religious conservatives to have a voice in ordinary political give and take. We're still paying the price for that liberal judicial arrogance.