RANT - COUNTER RANT: WHAT EVERYBODY NEEDS IS A GOOD HOBBY

So I am driving yesterday and hear a story on NPR about how some investigative effort uncovered the fact that Hobby Lobby’s pension fund has a small investment in a company that owns a company that makes some of the drugs and devices that are the cause of Hobby Lobby wanting an exemption from paying for through the government health care plan.  My first thought was, “Ooooooh!  That’s not good.” 

 

Now, the thing about NPR is that they always brag (here I am going to do the same thing that I am accusing them of doing) about how they just report the news, they have no agenda.  They like to drag this statement out particularly during fund raising time.  It may even be that they believe it.  But I do not believe it; this segment being one example of why.  The questions being asked by the interviewer were so incredibly leading as to be humorous.  “So do you think that Hobby Lobby is being hypocritical?  Do you think they know and don’t care?”  The idea is to place Hobby Lobby in as negative a light as possible.  If this were a court of law I would think some wise lawyer would stand up and say, “Objection your Honor.  Leading the witness!”  If they were really interested in just reporting facts, a better question for the interviewee who can have any opinion they want would be, “What do you think this means about Hobby Lobby?” or some such thing.  There were a few more underhanded and double standard tactics that they took that really made me steam the inside of my windshield, but that’s for another day. 

 

An interesting questions that keeps coming up however is can a corporation have religion?  NPR would say, “Of course they can’t.”  Adam’s Ale and its staff, contributors, executive board, foundation, and chaplain (all of whom are me) say, “Of COURSE the can and do.”  Our government has religion and right now it wants to pass on that new part of its religion that it holds most dear.  (I know I’ve said this before, please put up with me.)  There is no such thing as a neutral position.  There is no natural state that includes everybody.  If you actively remove God from the government, from schools, from business, from public life, from everything outside the four walls of a church, synagogue, or temple, that too constitutes a set of beliefs with its own vision of what man is, his purpose and meaning, what the foundational rules are, its own set of presuppositions, beliefs, and rules that creates its own world view and way of living.  That is not some vacuum in which tolerance reigns and we can all get along.  If we say, “Okay, Hobby Lobby, as a business you cannot have religion,” what we are really saying is, “You cannot have your religion.  You must have ours.”

 

Everything and everyone has a religion cleverly disguised as a set of beliefs and standards to be imposed in areas they find very important.  Right now we are asking the question, “May I exercise my strongly held beliefs in my own house, or does the government have the right to come in and establish its religion.”

WHY I HATE RELIGION BUT LOVE JESUS

Okay Adam's Alers - time to put your thinking caps on. This first video is eating up the Internet. As of this writing it has had over sixteen million views! Quite incredible.  This young gentleman is making the argument that Jesus came to destroy religion.  Listen to it with a critical mind.  Many of us will be confronted with one of points or another that he makes here.  How would you respond?


Before you read (or view) on, think about what he said.  Bearing in mind what you know about the faith how would you respond?  Where might you find flaws in his commentary?  Do you know enough about your faith to make comment?

Below is one response from Fr. Robert Barron from Word on Fire.  Of course it is not as slick or entertaining and unfortunately he seems rather annoyed (maybe exasperated) with the young man.  But here is a beginning of a good response.



Responses are coming in spades from all over the place and you can see them on Youtube.  Here is another young man making a different tact from the one above.



I like his style, his respect, and his sincerity.  But how would you go even further?  Was there anything in that first video that struck you as not quite right?  It is a great exersize to watch it and respond if to nobody else to yourself so that when you are thusly confronted you will have had the advantage of thinking it over already.

I will try tomorrow (time willing) to give just some responses that I have to the video.

HATFIELDS AND THE MACOYS

Our secretary had an egg for lunch the other day.

“Did you hear the good news?” she asked, “Science now says that we can have an egg a day!”

What you are about to read may sound like a rip on science but it is not. It is just brought up in order to make a point.

Because of science my Mother started buying oleo because science said it was better for you. Later they said it was not. In fact, it was one of the worst dietary things you could put in your body.

The eleven glasses of water we were supposed to drink a day? It could potentially kill you.

The various predictions of the end of the world in our time due to over population and lack of food – well, I’m still here. And my computer is still working after Y2K to boot.

Diet pop may now harm you BUT we should start drinking wine and eating dark chocolate now.

The food pyramid that we learned in grade school is gone replaced by something else.

Now if you were to present these ideas (and many more) to a scientist and say, “This is why I am having difficulties giving myself over completely to science,” he might reply, “You have to understand what is going on. Sometimes there is just bad science going on by scientists who are not so good. Sometimes companies manipulate science in order to sell things such as the tobacco industry hiring scientists to say that there was no scientific evidence that smoking was bad for your health. There are fads in science also that just need to work through and get out such “quality time” with your kids being even better than just wasting time with your kids. It does not diminish true science however. True science brings us to truth and benefits all of humankind. It was faulty science that said we would all be well into starving by now but it was also science that prevented us from starving.”

I would agree.

But now reverse it. Imagine a scientist pointing out all of the damage that people have done in the name of religion. It would be just as easy if not easier to come up with a list. We might say to him, “You have to understand what is going on. Sometimes there are just bad Christians preaching religion that is not so good. Sometimes pastors will manipulate people with religion to get you to donate money to expand their ministry. There are fads in religion that just need to work through and get out such as felt banners. It does not diminish religion however. True faith brings us to truth and benefits all of humankind. It was faulty religion that predicted the end of the world at various times but it was also religion that helped see people through those times.

Science and religion both have their public tasks cut out for them though science seems to have an upper hand in public relations at the moment. But it should always be that: Science AND religion working at their best to bring us to truth – and this is one of the things that I love about the Catholic Church that it does respect science as much as it does.

OF COURSE YOU KNOW THIS MEANS WAR from BUGS BUNNY

Politics have been the cause of so many wars in history. It is obvious that politics are bad for human beings. Therefore it is my recommendation that we should get rid of all politics.

While we are at it we should get rid of all land ownership, ethnic differences, wealth, power, natural resources, national pride, and national memories. All of these have caused numerous wars over the centuries. We cannot live with it any longer! It is time we rid ourselves of all these things!

I hope you get my point. I made the mistake of listening to the radio concerning the Pope’s visit to England (to which he was invited by the way.) The ranting about how evil he and the Catholic Church are was at fever pitch. I will give kudos to the program for bringing some non-disgruntled Catholics on to give other views of the visit – quite an unusual event in and of itself. But to the rest of it I just kept telling myself, “Just listen so that you can speak intelligently about this,” but it was just one unsubstantiated, illogical diatribe after another. I have absolutely no problem with someone who wants to engage in a conversation about any topic calmly and intelligently, but this reached to point of ridiculousness.

I can’t even go into everything that was said but one guest on the show – not a call in – went on at length about how religion should be wiped off the face of the earth because it has been the cause of death and war for centuries. He was so worked up that the host had to turn off his microphone and move on. Has God and religion been cited as reasons to go to war and/or to rally troops? Yes. Absolutely. Even by popes and leaders of other religions. But does that mean that religion leads to war? Hardly.

There are two things to consider here. One is similar to reasons people give for leaving the Church. There is usually the presenting problem. For example; “I think the Church is unfair and uncaring about (blank),” and there is usually the real problem, “I was divorced, remarried without a decree of nullity, my new spouse wants nothing to do with it, we already have a kid, the Church won’t make it all go magically away and my parents are on my back.” Much easier to point at the evil Church than to take responsibility for one’s actions.

In war it may be that someone is saying, “This is a holy war! Fight on for God and for the Right!” That is the presenting reason whereas the real reason is, “They have oil!” or “We want that land” or “I want to be richer and more powerful!” I mean, let’s be serious. Let’s take the case of a radical Christian (not a person who simply does as he wills yet claims to be a Christian and acting for Christ.) If you are a radical follower of Christ you embrace poverty, you glory in your weaknesses, you fail to see but Christ in another, you are moved to forgiveness and reconciliation and love of your enemy, and turning the other cheek. So does it sound remotely like someone who goes to war can truly declare they do so on behalf of Christianity alone? Only a simpleton would think so.

Of course we could make reference to even wars sanctioned or declared by the Church. It is always dangerous and completely unfair to judge anybody of past generations by the morays of the present. If you want to judge a war one cannot sit comfortably in their armchair with their cup of mocha and expound upon the horribleness of past epochs going to war over things they do not approve of without experiencing at least through the lens of historian the fear of, let’s say, a barbarian invasion in a time of little to no communication that, at least to their minds, seems to threaten the very existence of civilization itself.

Or say that Rome is sacked (yet again) and the Vatican is taken over and used for some other reason. Radically I don’t think Jesus would care one jot. But many people not on the level of Jesus would. We might think it Okay to go in and relieve Rome from her distress (which is actually at least partly our distress) but generations from now (especially if we should fail in our mission) might say, “See how they invaded our nation! Killed our people! Tried to suppress us!” and no doubt there would multitudes listening to their car radios nodding their heads and saying, “Yes! See! We should get rid of religion!”

Let us suppose for a moment that we could wave wand and get rid of all religious beliefs. Say I could wave it over the Middle East and like that – ZAP – all religious fervor is gone. Does anybody really think that all of the war would stop? Do they really think that it is really just about religion? And without those who really practice what their religion says do they really think we would do better without those who would say, “But if you are serious about religion we are really going too far!”

Well, anyway, that is what was rushing through my mind as I listened to the radio and since the only one who could hear me was Sebastian I thought that I would let at least part of it out here.

Believe me . . . Sebastian heard a lot more.