Posts Tagged ‘religion’

Not so fast on this one guys

Posted: July 29, 2010 by datechguy in internet/free speech, opinion/news, the courts
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When I first read this story my jaw dropped on the floor and rolled around a while:

A federal judge has ruled in favor of a public university that removed a Christian student from its graduate program in school counseling over her belief that homosexuality is morally wrong. Monday’s ruling, according to Julea Ward’s attorneys, could result in Christian students across the country being expelled from public university for similar views.

Sounded an awful lot like the Georgia case, I wrote about earlier. My outrage button was pushed and heading into overdrive but when I read the Fox story there was a twist that I noticed that should not be ignored:

She was removed from the school’s counseling program last year because she refused to counsel homosexual clients.

This is a most important sentence, we would not allow a doctor to refuse to treat a homosexual man, I can’t see how this is different than an Islamic bus driver keeping a guide dog off the bus.

A counselor’s job is to give advice, there is nothing wrong with a counselor shaping and framing that advice based on their beliefs (we are all of us are shaped by our beliefs) but to refuse a patient based on said beliefs, particularly in a training program, that’s off.

In private practice a person can pick and choose patients, but during training that is a different matter altogether.

Let’s put it another way. Murder is a mortal sin, Adultery is a mortal sin, Theft is a Mortal sin, all are explicitly prohibited by the 10 commandments. Would Julea Ward refuse to treat a person who committed any of these sins as well?

Christianity explicitly teaches that homosexual acts are sinful (many protestant denominations consider homosexuality itself a sin). It is a serious sin, but it is not the only sin, when we pretend that it is we make a grave mistake, almost as large as the mistake that is made when one pretends it is not sinful at all. One can magnify the legitimate sins of others in order to ignore our own. This is a trap not of our political foes making but of our spiritual foes making and its eternal consequences are much more dangerous to us as individuals.

Christian belief is not based on the separation of one from sinners, we are all sinners, it is based on the separation of one from sin and the willingness of Christ to forgive sin when one repents.

So lets be clear on what the 1st Amendment does and what it doesn’t do:

• Julea Ward has a right to follow any religion she chooses, natural law AND the 1st Amendment guarantees this right.

• A public university has no business trying to force any student or employee to change any person’s religious (or political) belief, that is a totalitarian act contrary to the natural law and the 1st Amendment.

• Any such speech code or rule by a public university to restrict the free expression and/or practice of religious (or political) belief is unconstitutional on its face per the 1st Amendment.

• Any and all such public universities who attempt to enforce such codes to change any person’s religious (or political) belief violating 1st Amendment rights should be sued until they are so broke that they have to go back to slide rules.

• A public university CAN however require that a student follow the basic rules of a degree program. An Islamic student can’t refuse to study the anatomy of a dog or pig if they want a degree in Veterinary medicine.  That is not a first amendment issue.

Julea Ward put herself in the wrong by refusing to counsel a homosexual student: From the ruling:

“In the case of Ms. Ward, the university determined that she would never change her behavior and would consistently refuse to counsel clients on matters with which she was personally opposed due to her religious beliefs – including homosexual relationships.”

In such a case the correct and honorable move for Miss Ward would be to tell the patient openly that she considers homosexual relationships wrong and that her advice would be informed by that belief. She could then give said patient the option to either continue with her or request a different counselor. This empowers and informs the patient without violating personal beliefs. If the patient wished to continue with her she could give advice based on actions that are harmful (lying, selfishness, deceit etc) in any type of interpersonal relationship.

And the university put itself in the wrong by trying to change her beliefs:

Ward’s attorneys claim the university told her she would only be allowed to remain in the program if she went through a “remediation” program so that she could “see the error of her ways” and change her belief system about homosexuality.

By attempting to create a single mindset within said program the university harms itself by closing of it’s own mind and robs potential patients of the perspective and philosophy that can benefit them.

There is no question that the media culture and university culture is trying to promote and protect homosexuality (remember Dirkhising Christian & Newsom? Exactly!) and to attack Christianity as a rule. Let’s avoid helping them out in their endeavor.

Memeorandum thread here.

Update: I think we on the right are missing that key detail that makes this case different than the Keeton case. I would however concede that the Clinton appointed judge would have likely gone with the university even if she didn’t refuse the patient treatment.

Update 2: Outside the Beltway almost gets it.

This really isn’t complicated: You’re allowed to believe whatever you wish. Under the 1st Amendment, you’re allowed to say or write just about any damned fool thing you please without fear of sanction from your government. You’re also allowed wide berth in the practice of your religious beliefs.

But public institutions are allowed to set policies that conflict with some people’s religious beliefs, so long as they have a rational, secular basis for doing so. In this case, EMU did. It would be simply absurd to allow students to participate in a program designed to provide counseling credentials who would never be able to get licensure as a counselor.

This misses the point here, if a license is not allowed based on a religious belief that is a religious test and unconstitutional. If they decide a believing Catholic, Muslim or Protestant can’t be certified that is a de-facto religious test made by a public university based on beliefs also unconstitutional. It wasn’t the beliefs of Miss Ward that were the proper grounds, it was the INACTION in refusing to treat the patient that constituted the proper grounds for the University to act.

Update 3: The Anchoress zings in her own gentle way at the very end of this post

I guess my question is, if a gay counseling student expressed an inability to “embrace” religious people or their values also be subject to remediation? Are we drowning in irony, here?

Bazinga!

Answer: “The person in question is not Islamic”

Posted: July 26, 2010 by datechguy in internet/free speech
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Q: What is the one thing you can be sure about when reading this headline: “University to student: Accept homosexuality or leave“?

The story follows:

The suit alleges the university retaliated against Keeton for stating her belief that homosexuality is a lifestyle choice and not a “state of being,” and that gender is not a social construct subject to individual change. According to the suit, the school wants her to undergo a “thought reform” program intended to change her religious beliefs. She faces expulsion unless she complies, and the suit seeks to block the university from throwing her out for noncompliance.

“Is saying there is such a thing as a male and a female as distinct, and that gender isn’t merely a social construct … such a dangerous position that it has to be banned from a profession?” French asked.

According to court documents, one of Keeton’s professors, Dr. Mary Jane Anderson-Wiley, told her this past May she would have to undergo a remediation program intended to change her views on homosexuality.

The university’s Counseling Education Program handbook proscribes such programs for those whose conduct is “not satisfactory on interpersonal or professional criteria unrelated to academic performance.”

Can anyone honestly describe this as anything less than totalitarian? Would such a program directed at a gay student forcing them to accept say Baptist teaching on Homosexuality be allowed at a state university?

I think not.

Here is the kicker:

Anderson-Wiley reportedly complained about Keeting’s Christian belief that homosexuality is sinful and demanded she choose between her faith and the American Counseling Association’s Code of Ethics.

“You couldn’t be a teacher, let alone a counselor, with those views,” court documents quoted Dr. Paulette Schenck, another of the university’s counseling professors, as having said in response to Keeting’s affirmation of her Christian beliefs.

No Christians need apply apparently. No wonder universities seem to have such a love of Chavez, Castro et/al they have the same thought police ambitions on a smaller scale.

Would the above mentioned Dr. Schenck dare say this to an Islamic student who believed in Sharia? Of course not, totalitarians are notorious cowards.

Joy McCann’s essay on St. Paul…

Posted: July 19, 2010 by datechguy in catholic, opinion/news
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…should be read by any person who wants to understand just how radically different Christianity was regarding women.

One of the things that people forget about inspired scripture is that with the possible exception of Moses, when it was actually written the author, (in this case Paul of Tarsus) didn’t sit down, pen in hand to say: “Ok time to write the scriptures”. Each author was in fact writing for a particular reason.

In the case of Paul this is more pronounced than any other example. Paul’s letters were in fact, letters. Specific instruction and advice for specific churches for both general instruction and to handle individual issues.

One of the biggest dangers in scripture is the tendency to take specific quotes out of context to make an individual point. I see a lot of this particularly when debating non-catholics and atheists. In scripture it can’t be over stated that things need to be in context. Joy Addresses this:

The lines must be interpreted in the context of a Church that did place women in leadership. As J.R. Kirk has pointed out, Romans 16’s long list of early church leaders included some female names: Phoebe (whom Paul referred to as a deacon, though the word is often translated as “minister”), Prisca, Julia, Mary, and Junia, who is referred to as “relative and fellow prisoner” of Paul’s. Along with Adronicus, Paul says, Junia was “prominent among the apostles,” and was in Christ before Paul’s own conversion. (Junia is often translated as “Junius,” a masculine name.)

Paul did not want Christians to conform to the dictates of the world, nor did he want us to violate them. We are to transcend them. He was brought into faith directly by the Lord, the same Jesus Christ who first explained that it was as much adultery for a male to break the bonds of matrimony as for a female; the same Lord who showed himself first to women when he rose from the dead; the Lord who ate with female prostitutes. And it was this Lord who admonished Martha that learning the Word was more important than cooking or housework (Luke 11:38-42).

Let’s take another example Ephesians 5. I’ve actually written about this before but lets do it again. Most people who want to cry misogyny in the church look at verses 22-25 but lets look at the verses 21-33 in context. All Emphasis mine:

21: Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.

The concept of being subordinate to each other suggest equality, something very radical for the time.

Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is head of his wife just as Christ is head of the church, he himself the savior of the body. As the church is subordinate to Christ, so wives should be subordinate to their husbands in everything. v22-24

This is the verse that gets people all a twitter. For its time there is nothing odd about it. The subordinate place of women was well established in culture for centuries at this point. It is often made optional when it comes up for reading. My parish priest’s tackled it a few years ago. I want you to remember the text in italics it is very important.

Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the church and handed himself over for her to sanctify her, cleansing her by the bath of water with the word, that he might present to himself the church in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. v: 25-27

Note that As Christ loved the church. Can you measure how much Christ loved the church? That in itself is a radical statement but the next one is even more radical:

So (also) husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. V 28

That is the ultimate statement of equality. The wife is the same as the husband, and must be loved as one loves oneself.

For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, v:29

“No one hates his own flesh.” Paul is breaking the rules of centuries here. He is re-writing culture in an absurd way for his time. Can you imagine how this must have sounded in the 1st century?

because we are members of his body. “For this reason a man shall leave (his) father and (his) mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” v:30-31

This is significant because by this line he directly links Christ’s words to this whole argument. He shows that this is not just his opinion but the command of Christ.

This is a great mystery, but I speak in reference to Christ and the church. v32

To a first century person this would be a great mystery, this whole idea is a great mystery.

In any case, each one of you should love his wife as himself, and the wife should respect her husband.V33

And the big finish. Repeating what was already said. Reinforcing it.

In conclusion taken for its time this was an incredible statement. Paul is making the case for the respect for woman in the 1st century and it is from that base that western civ has reached the point it has.

And just one other note. Remember in the dark ages it was the Church and the monks who copied scripture that kept it in place and decided what was inspired scripture. If the Catholic Church was as hostile to women as some pretend how easy would it have been for the Catholic church to in that first millennium to exclude that from scripture or drop or it declare it wrong. Who could have stopped them? It was within the church that scripture and literacy was the most prevalent. Yet guided by the Holy Spirit it did not.

It is not a coincidence that the Koran although it steals a lot from the Bible it never quotes Paul. It’s misogyny would have a hard time coping with it.

Some News from Illinois:

Posted: July 14, 2010 by datechguy in elections, internet/free speech, opinion/news
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There is some news from Illinois via the American Papist on the Illinois firing scandal. Take a peek at the form letter they are sending out:

I learned of this action on the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) campus late last week and immediately asked Chancellor Robert Easter, who oversees the campus, to provide me with a briefing on the matter. I want to assure you that the University administration shares my commitment to the principles of academic freedom. At the same time, we do believe it’s important to fully investigate all of the details related to this situation. As I’m sure you’re aware, it is sometimes the case that public reports may convey only part of the story. I think it important to reserve judgment until I have all of the facts and I hope you’ll agree.

We have asked the UIUC Senate’s standing Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure to immediately review this action. This is the mechanism on the campus through which these matters should be vetted. We expect this review to be completed very soon. By using our channels of shared governance and review, we are in the best position to make informed decisions that afford a fair process for all.

If you don’t think these guys are worried, you’re right:

Chancellor Robert Easter has asked the University of Illinois’ Senate Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure to determine whether the university violated the academic freedom and right to free speech of adjunct professor Dr. Kenneth Howell.

Howell, who has taught in the university’s Department of Religion since 2001, was recently fired for explaining in a class on Catholicism that the Church believes that homosexual behavior violates natural moral law.

University President Michael Hogan addressed faculty senators on Monday, after receiving 100 e-mails about Howell’s case, reported The News-Gazette.

“We want to be able to reassure ourselves there was no infringement on academic freedom here,” Hogan said. “This is a very, very important, not to mention a touchy and sensitive, issue. Did this cross the line somehow?”

Why are they worried? Because they are being noticed.

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