Here in the United States, we are all familiar with the phrase that “all men are created equal.” Thomas Jefferson first used the phrase in our Declaration of Independence and it’s been repeated countless times and across the world. Unfortunately, it seems like few people actually think about the implications this would have for global policy making. Not surprisingly, the blind fools following Ron Paul; who evoke the Founders at every turn as though they just had lunch with them; are the most oblivious.
A while ago, a handful of good people from here in Northwest Indiana asked me, “Can a Christian be a libertarian?”
The short version of my answer was, “There are too many denominations to say anything about all Christians, but from my perspective – no.” My primary argument was rooted in the equal creation of men.
One of the most important stories in the Bible is when Kane kills his brother Abel.
Genesis 4:9
And the Lord said to Cain: Where is thy brother Abel? And he answered, I know not: am I my brother’s keeper?
What better introduction to the Bible can there be than Genesis? It establishes that man is fallen so that everything that follows can tell us how to find salvation. And then Kane asking the question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” – and God doesn’t answer him directly, almost like it would be spoiling what is to come next. The answer to Kane’s question, of course, is YES! YOU ABSOLUTELY ARE YOUR BROTHER’S KEEPER!
Matthew 25:40
And the king answering, shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.
Generally speaking, I think most American Christians at least try to live up to this incredibly challenging standard set for them when it comes to other Americans. The question at the core of this post is whether or not this standard applies to our international brethren as well.
It’s important because the issue keeps manifesting itself in many different ways in our increasingly globalized world.
Should Christians leave water, food, and maps around our southern border for illegal immigrants to ensure their SAFE crossing or let them suffer and very possibly die a grueling death?
Should the United States aggressively promote human rights and popular uprisings against dictatorships where our help is desired, such as Libya and Syria? Are Americans the only people who have a right to choose their government or do all people deserve that freedom? (The American Revolution would have failed if it wasn’t for French assistance, so don’t give me that nonsense about doing it by themselves – especially in an era of flying gunships, smart bombs, automatic firearms, and digital warfare)
Should we aggressively fight any government attempting genocide to save millions of innocent lives?
Should we urge Israel to give millions of Christians and Muslims in the West Bank the right to vote for representation in Israel’s government or grant statehood to the Palestinians?
Should we make our petitions for the respect and independence of Tibet and her people and culture more forceful?
After all, if Americans were experiencing religious, ethnic, or cultural, or civic oppression, the government would step in and defend the rights we believed were given to us by our universal Creator.
If you believe Christianity tells you that strangers, even those from foreign lands, are your brothers; if you believe all men are created equal and not just all Americans; we have some evaluating to do of our foreign policy.
Happy New Year, readers. Iowans will caucus today and before any of my Iowa readers possibly embarrass themselves by supporting Ron Paul, I want to make one final case against him and the militant idiot brigade that’s supporting him.
If you’re thinking about supporting Ron Paul, it’s probably because you’re biggest issue is the outrageous growth of government in not just size and cost, but it’s involvement in our everyday lives. Listen, I’m with you 100% on this. The passage of Obamacare and the immoral tactics which were used to get it out of the Senate woke a lot of people up.
The fact that there are those among us who will naturally lean towards the most anti-government should come as no surprise, given the trend of things. Human beings are naturally reactionary, after all. But as conservatives, we need to understand the risks of reactionary politics and there is no greater example of this than history. We like to talk about Rome falling because of its own corruption. We hear less about the fall of the Weimar Republic. Their democratic republic died when the people, divided by two extremist ends of reactionary political ideology, freely elected the Nazi Party to power. The other extreme was Communism.
Now, I’m not saying Ron Paul is a Nazi, although his hatred for Jews and blacks mixed with the cult-of-personality he has created for himself may bring us to that conclusion if we looked at it more closely. What I do mean to say is that reactionary politics rarely end where you want them to.
If you read enough on conservative literature from the last century and earlier, you’ll see time and again the same argument against reactionary politics. To be reactionary is to be progressive. “People don’t have healthcare?! The government ought to do something!” “The government did something?! The government ought to stop doing anything!”
Practically speaking, Ron Paul has zero chance of winning the GOP nomination. If he becomes the anti-Romney candidate, it will only ensure his candidacy. But let’s say Romney is assassinated by a Ron Paul supporter. Paulbots are utter cowards, but let’s just say it happens and, for some stupid reason, the Republican Party decides to make him our 2012 candidate. This already isn’t going to happen, but libertarians already live in a fantasy world, so it’s not as much of a stretch for them. We would then be left with an Barack Obama vs. Ron Paul contest. How do you honestly think that will end?
Any national security Republican will see Ron Paul’s idiot plan to cut military spending and dismantle the CIA as an enormous threat to our national security and global stability and vote for Obama.
Mainstream fiscal conservatives, while perhaps acknowledging that the Federal Reserve is being mismanaged, will realize the US is far better with the Fed than without it. They’ll vote for Obama for economic security and stability.
Ron Paul’s radical stance against Israel and support for the legalization of dangerous narcotics is going to scare away a lot of religious conservatives, too.
Even if these national security, fiscal stability, and Christian-right conservatives don’t actually vote for Obama, they aren’t going to vote for Ron Paul. In other words, they’ll stay home. That leaves a minority of radical anti-conservative reactionaries and anarchists representing Republican candidates NATION-WIDE against all of the Democratic Party.
Guess who wins in landslide fashion?
Instead of supporting a limited government platform with another candidate, Ron Paul’s reactionary supporters are choosing a radical anti-government platform that the American people will undoubtedly reject on a massive scale; giving Barack Obama the greatest mandate of any President in history along with an incredibly powerful Democrat Congress.
This is the danger of reactionary politics that radicals in the minority are so often blind to.
With regards to Ron Paul, I can’t say that I’m surprised. This racist, antisemitic conspiracy clown is one of the biggest hypocrites the Washington Beltway has ever known. On one hand, he denounces pork-barrel spending, while on the other hand ensuring that millions of federal tax dollars go towards pork projects in his district. With one hand, Ron Paul and his un-showered supporters are pointing their fingers at corrupt “neo-cons” while the other hand is simultaneously giving bribes to politicians so they can get their way.
Some of their supporters like to claim that, “Things were like that before, but everything is great now! Nobody really has anything to fear!”
And they’re right, we have nothing to fear except more of the same from these libertarian ass-clowns.
During President George W. Bush’s second inaugural address, the President spoke about his freedom doctrine; which many conservatives correctly tied to the developments in North Africa and the Middle East over the past year. In this address, President Bush (or at least his speech writers) shared some very relevant information with those who were paying attention and cared to remember six years later.
“This is not primarily the task of arms, though we will defend ourselves and our friends by force of arms when necessary. Freedom, by its nature, must be chosen, and defended by citizens, and sustained by the rule of law and the protection of minorities. And when the soul of a nation finally speaks, the institutions that arise may reflect customs and traditions very different from our own. America will not impose our own style of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way.”
It’s like he could see into the future. Maybe Karl Rove has a time machine!
As much fun as it would be, conspiracy theories about Karl Rove aren’t the reason why I’m writing this post on a train with my iPhone. I’m writing to address conservative and libertarian criticisms of the governments forming in Egypt and Libya (especially Libya); which have adopted elements of Sharia Law in forming their new nations.
It is as though the people of Libya, finally free of Gadhafi, are now expected to instantly form an entirely free and secular society… Or at least a Christian society if they absolutely MUST have a faith built into their national identity.
Well, that’s not who they are. I mentioned in an earlier post that Libya is dominated by varying and often conflicting tribes. The trick is for the National Transitional Council to find a common set of laws that everyone can agree with. Call me crazy, but in a country with such an enormous percentage of Muslims, finding those common laws and a sense of national identity in God through the Qur’an seems like a pretty darn good idea!
Plus, with all this patriotic and self-righteous testosterone running through conservative opinion in the United States, it seems necessary to remind people of America’s history in such matters.
For the first half of our national history, roughly 1/4th to 1/3rd of our total population consisted of slaves. Liberty, indeed.
Until the 20th century, half of our population couldn’t vote because they were women. Democracy in action. It wasn’t even until the latter half of the 20th century that all citizens were guaranteed equal rights.
Oh, and our freedom of religion? Catholics were only allowed to vote in two states when our nation, the champion of freedom, was born.
And I know I needn’t go into all the abuses our government and national founders waged against the native American-Indian population.
It took us 235 years to get where we are as a country today, and we’re still a work in progress. Expecting Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Iraq, Afghanistan, or any other newly free country to magically turn into a mini-America overnight is ridiculous, arrogant, and condescending.
What we too often fail to realize in our short-sighted political goals and is that liberalism (lower-case “l”) is an experiment. Freedom means many things to many different people and western liberal political ideology isn’t necessarily the path for all the diverse people’s of this world to realize their personal dreams of freedom.
One thing I’m certain of, however, is that overnight libertarianism is far more dangerous to the people of Libya and the world than a moderate and modern approach to Sharia Law.
Here’s the video and transcript of the “Ungodly Discipline” segment aired on AC360 on the night of September 22, 2011. Kudos to everyone involved who made this story possible.
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Tonight (Thursday, September 22) at 7pm Central, Anderson Cooper (host of Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN) is airing a story that takes place in my humble hometown of Chesterton, IN. Despite all the really awesome things about this town and community that I love so much, the story isn’t going to be a positive one. Perhaps you’ve seen one of his “Ungodly Discipline” segments before on his show. Well, after airing the show, former members of the Fairhaven Baptist church are coming forward with some horrifying stories to share with national television. While I won’t know what is being brought forward in the article until after I watch the segment, I do know that former church members are starting to share their stories on Facebook.
After exchanging e-mails with some of the brave people who left the “cult,” I decided to share some of the shared stories here. The only editing I’ve done to the paragraphs below are formatting changes to allow for the content to be read easier in this blog format. (I pressed enter to make paragraphs and added titles.)
In the interest of fairness, I have no way of validating the stories below except to say that the number of witnesses coming forward is alarming. At the same time, I have no reason to doubt them, either. If it matters, I believe the victims. For my own part, I grew up in this town and live here now. With that said, my contact with this seclusive church has been extremely limited. That alone is a red flag in a small and friendly town like Chesterton, Indiana. The contact I and many of my neighbors have had in the past has been from their church’s door-to-door solicitors. On more than one occasion as children, my younger sister and I were told that we were going to hell if we didn’t go to church with them.
To be honest, their approach of selling God like obnoxious vacuum cleaner salesmen only further strengthened my Catholic faith growing up. Unfortunately, this type conduct and the horror stories from the rare excommunicated transfer students to our excellent public school also did a lot to enforce the cynicism towards religion as a whole among some of my peers.
Read the stories below and I think you may begin to understand why.
The Mexico Trip:
… This was the first major trip the youth group had taken after Voegtlin and Damron took over the youth group. Whitecar was along for the ride as well… And everyone of these guys had a chip on their shoulder and something to prove. My father was along on this trip as a bus driver along with some other old timers…R.L. Grant and Dean Leslie. These guys looked up to my dad as a sort of source of wisdom I guess…
As is in any youth group the younger kids are immature…thats why they are in 7th grade. A few of the kids made some stupid mistakes, some hardly worth mentioning, yet Damron felt like he needed to come down hard with an iron fist. Darcel McCoy did something silly and stupid in the shower but was accused of deliberately trying to urinate on someones tooth brush…(He didn’t) in case you were wondering… Caleb Stockman and Tom Almanza were seen on the opposite side of the road without permission and had stopped to buy a coke or something silly…nothing really offensive or a deep sin.
The next day we were not allowed to eat lunch or have anything to drink…mind you this is Mexico in summertime 100+ degree temperature in the shade…(and at this point none of us knew why we were being punished) We spent the day knocking on doors and inviting people out to see a film at a mission church that we were there to help…It was nothing more than brick walls with a tin roof, as it got later people began to show up at the church and the girls were allowed to sit down with them…The guys were sent upstairs under the tin roof in a room with no windows or ventilation, we sat up there and waited and waited for about 2-3 hours (still no idea, and pretty hungry and thirsty and PO’d by this time…)
After the service finished we got on the bus to head back to the compound that we were staying at and were told no one was allowed to talk. We wondered if they were finally going to feed us or at least tell us what was going on… But when we got back to the gym where we slept each night we were told to get changed and go to bed…once again, no talking. By this time I knew something was up…and didn’t think for a minute that we were going to be getting a good nights sleep…
Lights had been out for about 30 minutes when the gym doors came crashing open and garbage cans went flying like an opening scene from Full Metal Jacket… And Carl Bain in all his glory yelled for us to square the deck away…now most of these kids weren’t raised in military families and had no clue they just stood there…Finally he got it across that he wanted them to clear out an area in the middle of the floor and form a circle. They then began to berate everyone in the gym, saying “You guys don’t take this serious, ‘You wanna play games?’ fine we are going to play some games!”
They called Darcel, Caleb, and Tommy into the center of the circle and sat them down in chairs next to a fan and fed them steak fajitas and sandwiches, made sure they were nice and comfortable. Then began to make us do PT jumping jacks, sit-ups pushups, bends and thrusts(ask someone who has been in the military, what bends and thrusts are) then leg lifts while Steve Damron ran around the room stepping on each persons stomach saying that if they were doing it right they wouldn’t be able to feel him…
All the while we were told that we were being punished because of the 3 in the middle…this went on for about an hour and a half with no stop. Finally we are told to stand up…and they pulled Darcel into the middle and told us what he had done…or what they thought he had done…And they began to force him to drink liquid…It started out with bottles of arizona tea and then 2 liters of coke and gallons of water…I literally watched his stomach swell up from the liquid he was trying to ingest…and as if this wasn’t enough…Jeff Voegtlin…and I’m quoting him and dare him to dispute it…said “Only a “NIGGER” would do something like what you did butch…” ( Darcel is an African American by the way) then they forced him to drink more water until he literally exploded vomited and urinated all over himself and what not every where…
Then they made him clean it up and we went back to doing more PT while they sat him back down with his compadres…they had shut the air off in the gym as well, to make it more comfortable for us…”How thoughtful” after about another 45 min to an hour of this, they once again clarified they were punishing us as a whole due to the sins of those three guys…and that they were going to go outside for a break and kept saying they trusted that we would take care of it…As soon as they closed the doors behind them the entire 60-70 guys jumped the three in the middle…
Caleb was lucky he was a bit stocky and no one wanted to mess with him…Darcel and Tommy got the brunt of it…I watched tommy’s brother Andy beat the crap out of him…hitting him with his class ring and bouncing his head off of the cement, all the while yelling that tommy had sent some poor mexicans to hell because of his playing around and not being serious… Tommy the next day could not open his eyes they were swollen shut and Im pretty sure he had one if not several concussions…both he and Darcel would have been admitted to any emergency room here in the states , but those Jerks didn’t even have the thought to check them out….(Had they died or had been paralyzed this story would have taken a much different turn)
We were then told to go to sleep and not talk about any of this to the girls the next day…
Darcel’s Version of the Story: The doors in the shower was broken, and I couldn’t get out. I was 13yrs old and had to pee! So I went in the shower! Since I told them “I couldn’t hold it” I was forced to drink gallons of water and coke and tea until I had to pee, then made to urinate on myself. Again, this is after puking several times all over myself because of all the liquids being forced down. (tea, coke, dirty water)
Michael’s Story:
I remember this day like it was yesterday. Now mind the fact some of things I will say came to my knowledge years after the incident. Earlier in the day when most people were getting ready to go out canvassing, word started to spread around that staff was upset and people were going to be in trouble. So some people do what survival instincts prompted them to do and that was to save their own skin and tell on others. So Don Whitecar stood up and said if anyone has any information about people breaking the rules they need to come forward or everyone in the canvassing group would be punished. So we had people fabricating stories to save their own skin. They compiled a list of about 25 people that had “done wrong.”Since they were experts at making mountains out of mole hills, they said it was a widespread problem and needed to be dealt with. This is when Sam’s story comes into play. We also had gone to Mexico with a missions group that was not affiliated with our group and took their buses and people into chihuahua. So they put us down to bed until thwarting bus kids that came with us and the bearing precious seeds people were asleep out on the bus.While the people in the middle were eating they got the list of people out and one by one called them to the middle of the circle where Jeff Voegtlin was standing with a paddle. They were saying he was the executioner and would be administering swats. after you had been called out, they read the charges against you and decided on the how many swats you were to receive. They even had an algorithm to compute swats for some. For example they would say take the number of charges, multiply it times 3 and divide by 2. If it was an odd number that you divided by then they would ask what butt cheek you wanted half the swat on. Some were told to go butt naked for their swats. After this was done, they focused on darcel and made the kid, whose tooth brush was allegedly peed on, get his toothbrush for darcel to brush his teeth with.At the same time they told all the seniors to get their nice clothes and put them at the feet of darcel so that he would wet himself and the seniors clothes so they would be upset. Now mind touch, fairhaven staff was very good at prompting others to do their physical abuse for them. When darcel drank so much that he peed himself and the seniors clothes, they got in his face calling him names and shouting at him. They then walked out telling everyone they hoped the problem would be solved when they got back. It was not Andy who beat up tom, but I will not say who it was. People need to understand we had so much animosity, hatred and emotions stuck inside of us for so long that when the opportunity for an outlet came it came out with a vengeance. We would take our frustrations of staff out on others. After the beating, they made darcel clean the bathrooms with the toothbrush and was not allowed to pee or sleep that night.
The Cover-Up:
This story took place 15 years ago, but I have people willing to tell their stories from recent years as well. Many of us were too afraid to tell our parents (we had been told not to tell a soul) who had signed consent forms to allow these guys to “be responsible” for us. The staff learned not too long ago Caleb Stockman had a similar picture of Tommy after he had been beaten. They came to Caleb and requested he destroy the evidence in front of them.
My father was and is the Head of the Deacon Board there and I have been forewarned that if I am responsible for getting this story out in the news that all ties will be officially severed…this is a common occurrence among many of my friends. When they speak up against abuse or disagree with the church or Dr. Voegtlin their parents are pressured into disowning them and forbidding their other chidden from speaking to them. I hope you know that I don’t hate the “church” as much as I hate the 40+ years of abuse and ruined lives it has produced…Broken Families, Broken Relationships…
“X” Your Family:
I believe that there is abuse going on at Fairhaven. I was there from 1987 until 1992. I was affected by the way they conducted themselves and my family was affected also. There have been long term affects from the way they have raised children there and from their cruel ways and unforgiving nature. People there are taught that it is o.k. not to forgive and that it is o.k. to turn your back on your family…they say “X your family and that will erase them out of your life forever.” God says “forgive them and I will forgive you.” There is a whole lot more than just physical abuse going on there.
Striking Babies for Crying:
I personally observed some of the abuse when I babysat for one of the families in the church. It was my nursing home leader and I went home to babysit for them after our service that day. Their 2 year old daughter had fallen asleep during the service and when she got home she got 10 swats: 5 for falling asleep, 2 for crying and making noise when she was awakened, 2 for crying when told that she would be “dealt with” when she got home, and 1 for crying while the first 9 swats were being administered. They made me watch, then made it very clear that I was expected to do the same while they were gone. One of their kids did lie to me while I was there that afternoon, but I was so upset about what would probably happen that I didn’t tell the parents.
Parents Not Protecting Their Children:
I attended from 1977-1991, and to this day, I still become physically ill anytime I am in Chesterton because of this place. I pray that this exposure will finally lead to some justice for those who suffered from this awful place all in the “name of Jesus.” What was so hard to comprehend, was how the parents of these children just stood back and did nothing. Those who have children should know and understand that they are entrusted to us by God to love and protect.
Personally, I did not experience any physical abuse; I did experience emotional and psychological abuse. Like many others, it has taken a long time to get through it.
I pray that something will come from this national exposure. No more children and families should have to continue to suffer.
Drowning:
I remember and still have problems stemming from the treatment I received at Fairhaven. I was physically punished falsely so many times and treated like I was worthless. I remember when my favorite teacher, who never really fit in and was often criticized, suddenly drowned in the lake behind the church. He was an expert swimmer, young and healthy and he knew the lake like the back of his hand. There was much speculation surrounding his death and it still haunts me to this day. My self-esteem has suffered immensely because of this place. Thank God that my mother left when she did.
Gun Violence:
her son suffered physical abuses and was threatened and traumatized with a gun by staff members at Fairhaven. The broadcasts, as it appears has given many courage to come forward. Praise God and may they continue to do so!!!He was held at gunpoint as a young boy by Fairhaven staff member, while they assaulted him to some measure. We are currently gathering facts and seeking a secular teacher whom consoled the boy on the matter years ago.
Satan’s Fabricators:
you know what’s funny? i remember voeglin preaching about people like us. he said we were fabricators of stories and liars. that satan uses us to try to destroy creator’s work there. i guess i now fall into that category.
3rd Place Isn’t Good Enough:
i got the hell beat out of me when i came in 3rd place at a wrestling tournament instead of 1st. can’t remember his name but the youth pastor then (short, italian guy) was also the coach. he had me box 2 9th graders. 2 10th graders. 2 jr. and 1 sr. for losing. i was only in 8th grade. clearly remember that one. i still carry some anger from that time.
In Alpharetta, Georgia, a group claiming to be the “Milton County Tea Party Patriots Citizens Council” placed fliers in mailboxes, viciously attacking a private charter school. The reason? The Amana Academy offers Arabic language classes for kids from kindergarten to eighth grade. Among other things, the group uses blatant racism by describing Muslims as “camel jockeys” and “rag heads.” The purpose of the flyer was to warn the community that the school; which is requesting permission to build a bigger facility; is a “terrorist training camp.”
Now, I would like to take a moment to point some things out. First, there are millions of Christians who speak Arabic, many of who were born in countries dominated by Muslims and still live in those lands – peacefully. I have found that when dealing with ignorant people about this topic, one of the first errors they foolishly make is assuming Arab is synonymous with Muslim. In fact, there are many Arabs who are not Muslims and many more Muslims who are not Arabs.
Furthermore, teaching kids about the Arabic language is hardly treasonous. Do you have any idea how much money the United States government spends to train an Arabic linguist? Or how much they are willing to pay an Arabic linguist? I’ll tell you right now, there’s a much greater demand for Arabic linguists than for German, French, Spanish, and Japanese linguists. Being fluent in multiple languages has in fact been proven to increase academic performance in students in all areas. However, learning Arabic has the added benefit of being directly applicable to employment right out of school.
I don’t know anybody from my high school who was hired as a German, French, Spanish, or Japanese linguist upon graduating that didn’t enlist in the military. I’m willing to bet that, as long as these kids are encouraged through high school, that won’t be the case for the students of Amana Academy.
Anyway, back to the reason for this post. The Georgia Tea Party Patriots immediately jumped on this, insisting they have no knowledge of who this group is and thoroughly condemned the racist flyer.
“… We strongly condemn this type of flyer, its disgusting language and intention. This group is in no way permitted to use the name of the Tea Party Patriots.”
Part of the reason I got out of politics a year ago was because this kind of leadership was absolutely absent from both politicians and the grassroots leaders on the right. From my perspective, the right was allowing itself to be identified as the band of ignorant fools and racists the left has always said they were. I can’t speak for what’s happening in Georgia, but when Republicans tell me that they are blocking the building of a new road; which has already been paid for; because they’re worried it would make it easier for black people to come to their town, there is a serious and disgusting problem on the right. It’s a problem that won’t be solved until both party and grassroots leadership begins taking a zero-tolerance approach to allowing these people in their ranks.
I’m still waiting for the day that a politician comes out and says, “I would rather lose this election than win with the votes of racists.” It needs to be made absolutely clear that their disgusting intents have no place 21st century American politics.
Here in the United States, we are all familiar with the phrase that “all men are created equal.” Thomas Jefferson first used the phrase in our Declaration of Independence and it’s been repeated countless times and across the world. Unfortunately, it seems like few people actually think about the implications this would have for global policy making. Not surprisingly, the blind fools following Ron Paul; who evoke the Founders at every turn as though they just had lunch with them; are the most oblivious.
