It Is NOT a Crime To Be a Christian Politician

And there is NO Wall of Separation

OK folks,

Getting really tired of the complete BS and outright attacks from the Left on Christians. I really am. It is ALWAYS an Open Season on Christians. The Press openly attack us. The Left attack us. Jokes are made at our expense. Our President calls us Bitter Clingers. We are called Stupid. We are called Racists. We are called Chauvinistic, Homophobes. Jews are not too far behind us.

Yet? Ask a question about Islam? Can't do that. There are laws against it. There are laws against attacking ANYONE'S Religious Views. Ask questions about ANY Religion, other than Christianity, you will be held accountable. Christianity? ALWAYS Open Season. Forget the laws. Forget even imagined decorum. Just let it rip. Question them about their Faith and why they feel they do. Denounce their beliefs. Quiz them on what you may INCORRECTLY see as Biblical Inconsistencies or Contradictions. There are none. I repeat, NONE. Simply a lack of understanding. However, ask a Muslim why they feel it necessary to strap a bomb to themselves and blow up innocent people? COMPLETELY OFF LIMITS. YOU RACIST! How dare you ask that question. Right?

Why do Catholic worship Mary, kneel before the Pope, and have IDOLS, when the Bible says there is but ONE mediator between you and God, and he is IN you. Have no other Gods before God, and do not worship IDOLS. Yet? Just asking those questions, I will be called Anti-Catholic. A Sinner and a heathen. Right?

If I asks why Jews do not believe in Jesus, who was a Jew, called King of the Jews, HONESTLY asking why, I'm called an Anti-Semite. If I ask how anyone can believe in Reincarnation, I must be Racist. I do not accept Hinduism, Jainism, or Sikhism. I must HATE Indian people. Right?

Hell, if I tell the TRUTH, that Evolution MINUS God, is Scientifically IMPOSSIBLE, I'm called stupid, hateful, and closed minded. Something can not come from Nothing. It really is just that simple. Then if you get past that, how can Cold Blooded, Warm Blooded, everything from Trees to Mosquitoes all come from ONE Cell? They CAN'T. But yet, I'm stupid. I'm Insane. Yet, there are some who spend their ENTIRE Life fighting against something they do not even believes Exists, God. Who's Crazy?

Now I'm not advocating the denouncing of, or the attacking of, ANYONE'S Religion. I do not advocate the RESTRICTION on ANYONE'S First Amendment RIGHT of Freedom OF Religion. As long, of course, that does not include MURDERING Innocent People. There is NO WALL. We ALL have a RIGHT to Practice our Faith ANYWHERE and at any time we choose to. To this day, Congress is started with a Prayer. The Ten Commandments hang on the Wall of the Supreme Court, this is NOT a Secular Nation. We are a Nation to begin with for Religious Freedom. Now Atheists have done a pretty good job at rewriting the First Amendment, and American History, but that doesn't make it true.

So this piece by Rachel Zoll from the AP is no surprise. My guess is that she is probably NOT a Christian. I doubt that she even believes in God. Yet, she IS a Religion Writer over at AP. Here is her Piece Yahoo News / AP - A hot issue on the campaign trail: theology By RACHEL ZOLL - AP Religion Writer AP

Rick Perry dived right in. The Texas governor, now a Republican presidential candidate, held a prayer rally for tens of thousands, read from the Bible, invoked Christ and broadcast the whole event on the Web. There was no symbolic nod to other American faiths, no rabbi or Roman Catholic priest among the evangelical speakers. It was a rare, full-on embrace of one religious tradition in the glare of a presidential contest.

Why SHOULD there have been a "nod to other American faiths, no rabbi or Roman Catholic priest among the evangelical speakers?" It was a CHRISTIAN even. A PRIVATE Christian event. She goes on to say this:

In 1960, John F. Kennedy could blunt Protestant fears about his Catholicism by calling his religion private. After four decades of culture wars and Christian right activism, the Kennedy strategy no longer works. Politicians are evaluated not only by what church they attend, but also by what their congregation teaches and what their pastor says on Sundays.

"Candidates often have to make tough choices about their religion — whether to talk about it, what to say about it and even what to do about it — such as leaving a church," said John Green, director of the Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron, Ohio. "These tensions are quite strong among Republicans as the presidential nomination contest heats up, partly because of religious disagreements among key constituencies, but partly because of differences in issue priorities — economic vs. social issues."

Those Running should just be true to themselves and to their Faith. The People will decide if it is a PROBLEM with THEM or not. But to HIDE, what should be one of the most Important things in their lives, just to get elected? If you have a problem with some one's FAITH, if it is TRUE Faith, then you have a problem with the Person. Sorry, and a Person who has TRUE Faith, IS effected by that. You really can not separate the Person from their Core Values and Beliefs. If you do, what you have left is dishonest.

The current presidential campaign began with two cautionary tales fresh in the minds of political strategists:

In 2008, candidate Barack Obama broke ties with his Chicago pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, after videos surfaced of Wright sermonizing that U.S. foreign policy played a role in the 9/11 attacks. "America's chickens are coming home to roost," Wright said. Obama was so close with Wright that the Democrat took the title of his 2006 book, "The Audacity of Hope," from one of the pastor's sermons.

It wasn't Obama's Christian Faith or Christianity that people had a Problem with. It was the fact that his Pastor, that he loved and Followed for 20 years is a RACIST! One that HATES this Country. One that called for God to DAMN this Country. THAT is what people had a problem with. Not Obama's Relationship with God, but his relationship with an Anti-American, Racist.

Republican Mitt Romney was the other example. The former Massachusetts governor had struggled to address concerns about being Mormon despite a major faith-and-values speech in 2007 in Texas.

He quoted the New Testament and declared his belief in Jesus. (Many Christian denominations don't consider Mormons to be Christian.) He commended the deep faith of the Founding Fathers and decried secularism. And like Kennedy, he promised that "no authorities of my church, or of any other church for that matter, will ever exert influence on presidential decisions." Yet, polls continued to show an unwillingness to vote for a Mormon, especially among white evangelicals, who form a large segment of the GOP.

"That speech probably drew more attention to his Mormonism than it was worth," said Ed Kilgore, a former policy director at the centrist Democratic Leadership Council who oversaw programs that urged Democrats to talk about the values behind their policies. "It raised a lot of questions and didn't really resolve them."

Romney is once again seeking the GOP presidential nomination. He has barely discussed his religion so far.

Sorry Rachel, yeah some had a problem with his faith, but mostly, he ran out of money and QUIT. He has a few Other Problems that people are not going to overlook and Vote for him. Little, if not ANY of the Lack of Faith in Romney this time around has to do with his Religion.

Politicians like to quip that they're not running for theologian in chief. Still, they face increasingly complex questions on doctrine — prompted in many cases by their own attempts at highlighting their faith.

Republican Michele Bachmann has been asked to explain a statement she made in the context of her 2006 Minnesota congressional campaign — that she submits to the authority of her husband. The teaching is based on Ephesians 5:21-23 and other Bible verses. Evangelicals say the doctrine is about sacrificial love, the way Christ sacrificed himself for the church. A wife should put her husband's needs first and the husband should serve his wife, although some Christian conservatives view the teaching as a license to control their wives.

In a GOP debate ahead of the Iowa straw poll this month, Bachmann was asked by a conservative newspaper columnist to explain whether, as president, she would submit to her husband's authority. The audience booed the question. Bachmann was tight-lipped as she listened, then thanked the questioner and said that to her, submission means that she and her husband respect each other.

Bachmann also found herself in the midst of a row about — of all things — the Reformation. News outlets reported that the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, the tiny denomination she formally left around the time she launched her presidential campaign, said on its website that the papacy is the anti-Christ. (The Lutheran World Federation agreed in a 1999 joint statement with the Vatican to drop the doctrinal condemnation. The Wisconsin Synod is not a member of the federation.) Bachmann insisted she was not anti-Catholic.

Perry largely dismissed the outcry over his July prayer rally, held the week before he announced he was running for president.

The event was his idea and was financed by the American Family Association, a Tupelo, Miss.-based group whose policy director believes that freedom of religion applies only to Christians. Among the supporters were well-known Christian conservative leaders such as the Rev. Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention and Focus on the Family founder James Dobson. Other endorsers were Pastor John Hagee, a Christian Zionist who had called the Catholic Church "the great whore," though he later apologized for the statement. Activist and historian David Barton, who argues that the United States was founded to be a Christian nation, was another backer.

Religion was so in the foreground in the 2008 presidential race that for their first appearance on the same stage after their party conventions, Obama and Republican John McCain agreed to an event at a church where they would be interviewed by a minister.

The Rev. Rick Warren, founder of Saddleback Church in California, asked the candidates what faith in Jesus meant to them and at what point a baby gains human rights. For the latter question, McCain answered, "At the moment of conception." Obama joked that the question was "above my pay grade," then went on to explain the moral thinking behind his support for abortion rights. Obama soon after apologized for the way he started his answer, saying he was too flip.

"These folks are not professional theologians and, except in a few cases like Huckabee, they haven't been to seminary," said Gary Smith, author of "Faith & the Presidency" and a historian at Grove City College, a Christian school in Pennsylvania. Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and 2008 GOP presidential hopeful, is a Southern Baptist minister.

"Most of them haven't had more education about the relationship between Christianity and politics than the average person on the street," Smith said. "While they have their own personal faith, it isn't usually well informed by history and theology."

And yet, voters have started pushing for specifics because they no longer consider belief separate from action and faith unrelated to policymaking, said Kathleen Flake, who specializes in American religious history at Vanderbilt University. The nation's Catholic bishops, more vocal than ever on the duty of Catholic lawmakers to follow church teaching, underscored that way of thinking. Bishops have said repeatedly that a true Catholic cannot support any policy that allows abortion.

"The voting public no longer believes, as they did as late as the 1950s, that religion was about what you thought and not what you did," Flake said.

The trend started with Democrat Jimmy Carter, who in 1976 said at a campaign event that he was a born-again Christian.

OK this goes on and on. But it is basically all about Christians and the "conflict" between expressing their Faith and keeping Silent out of FEAR of Rejection by the People they hope to get Votes from. ONE Paragraph about Obama and his Pastor "Wright sermonizing that U.S. foreign policy played a role in the 9/11 attacks." which had NOTHING to do with ANYTHING, to all the rest of this about ACTUAL Faith of Candidates.

Now I disagree with some of my friends on the Right who say "fight this." I say be ready for it. They do not ask these types of questions to Liberals because they already know most Liberals do not believe in God or ANYTHING bigger than themselves. But they did, do, and will continue to ask these type of questions of ANYONE on the Right. Especially those who profess themselves to be, or are ASSUMED to be Christians. Just be ready for it and answer it honestly. Let the People Decide.

If you were to ask me outright, "Pete, do you really believe XWZ?" I will answer you. I will attempt to explain to you WHY. If you fail to understand what I tell you, may or may not be a product of your LACK of understanding or misconception of Scripture, or you may or may not LIKE my answer, but none of that changes my answer. If I ran and became President, I am the President for ALL Americans. You have the SAME Right to practice YOUR Faith, or lack of, as I do. But let me ONCE again, post the ACTUAL and OFFICAL Job Description of the President of the United States.

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Section 2 - Civilian Power over Military, Cabinet, Pardon Power, Appointments

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.

He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.

Section 3 - State of the Union, Convening Congress

He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.

Now notice NOWHERE in this Job Description does it mention Job Creation, Redistribution of Wealth, or CREATING New Laws and Regulations. Infringing in Personal Freedoms and the take over of Private Industries. His number one Job is to keep America Safe, and make sure that Laws of the Land are Enforced. Nowhere in there does it talk about leveling the playing field, spending Trillions of dollars, most of which going to line Friend's Pockets, traveling the World on Tax Payer's Bill for Vacation after Vacation.

When you actually see the REAL Job Description of President, you also see nothing in there about protecting people FROM Religion. Prohibition of Practicing one's Faith. Or saying only THIS Faith is acceptable to be President. So these questions that are often posed to Republicans are irrelevant and only serve one purpose, that is to attempt to paint a picture of them to the Voter, that they fit a stereotype that the Libs want you to believe. It really is just that simple.

It really is time for Christians to stand up and say enough is enough. If we are going to Protect People's Freedom OF Religion, then we must also protect Christians. But the reason this takes place is as simple as this.

22And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved. Matthew 10

12 But before all these, they shall lay their hands on you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues, and into prisons, being brought before kings and rulers for my name's sake. Luke 21

18 If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. John 15

So I guess it should really not come as any surprise. We were warned of this before hand. Still, it really drives me nuts. Especially because those hurling the accusations have no clue what they are talking about. Just remember, whenever you remove God, something else fills the Void.
Peter

Sources:
Yahoo News / AP - A hot issue on the campaign trail: theology