Participants: Lincoln Steed (Host), Tina Ramirez
Series Code: LI
Program Code: LI000215A
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00:22 Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
00:24 This is the program that brings you up to date news, 00:27 views, discussion and information 00:29 you many not have thought about on religious liberty issues. 00:32 My name is Lincoln Steed, Editor of Liberty Magazine. 00:35 And my special guest on this program is Tina Ramirez. 00:39 Welcome, Tina. 00:40 Thank you, Lincoln. It's nice to here with you. 00:42 Yeah. Good to have you on this program. 00:44 I had many guests 00:45 and you're one of the most knowledgeable I've had. 00:48 Thank you. I've lots to live up to today then. 00:50 Yes, I hope so. 00:51 And I want to find out why you're so knowledgeable. 00:53 Oh, okay. 00:54 I can give you a title for this program 00:57 because I want to find out, 00:58 something about your life and where you come from, 01:02 where you're going and what you're doing now. 01:04 So you can explain everything. 01:06 You are a familiar face to me in the religious liberty circles 01:10 or religious liberty activism circles in Washington. 01:14 Where should we start? 01:16 I don't know. Look into that area. 01:17 You don't have to start, you know, 01:19 what was it, Charles Dickens, 01:21 that's one of his novels,' I was born. 01:23 Yeah, I know. You don't have to go back that far. 01:26 Good, I'm glad. 01:28 But, you know, 01:29 how did you get into this religious liberty area? 01:31 What was moving in your mind as a young person? 01:33 No, no, I think that's okay. 01:35 We took a program on young people in religious liberty, 01:37 you must have started that way. 01:38 Yeah, when I was in college, 01:41 I started reading about lot of different missionaries 01:43 and my faith was growing, 01:45 and at the time as I was reading about, 01:48 people like Amy Carmichael in India, 01:50 and Elisabeth Elliot and her husband Jim Elliot 01:52 who was murdered by the Quichua Indians 01:53 down in Ecuador and just these amazing stories of faith 01:57 and of struggle and of people 01:59 that really counted the cross upon Christ lived it out. 02:03 I, my own faith was strengthened by it and I, 02:06 at the time I was going to 02:07 Vanguard University in southern California, 02:10 which is a small sublease of Guard school 02:12 and I was learning about 02:13 a lot of different world religions 02:15 and also about the persecution of Christians 02:18 in many different countries around the world. 02:20 At that time, I mean, 02:21 now the ancient persecution is different. 02:23 Yeah, this is in really 90s so at that time, 02:26 one of the biggest stories was what was happening in Sudan. 02:29 And I actually I just got back, 02:31 from working with some Sunnis recently and I just-- 02:35 Problem is not solved. No, no. 02:36 It's still ongoing, but my heart 02:38 has always been burdened for them, 02:40 and so really how I got started was that, 02:42 at that time as I was reading these stories 02:44 and my own faith was deepening. 02:47 I just-- God just put on my heart 02:50 the persecution of people in the church 02:52 and called me to really desire to work with them 02:56 and to help them and stand with them. 02:57 I remember one story in particular 02:59 in the chapel service at Vanguard, 03:01 of this girl in China, who'd been imprisoned, 03:04 and she could've just sat in her cell all day 03:06 but she had become a believer 03:08 and she wanted above all else, 03:10 just to share the gospel with other people. 03:13 So she asked the prison guard, 03:14 if she could go around to the different prison cells 03:17 and collect the human excrement from their cells, 03:21 so that she could-- 03:22 Was an excuse to go there and be able to talk to them. 03:24 Yeah, so that she talk to them 03:25 and so she would go from cell to cell 03:26 just sharing her faith. 03:27 And I thought, wow, 03:28 here I grew up in Orange County, California, 03:32 no hardship and here's a your girl in China imprisoned, 03:36 and all she wants to do is, 03:38 pick up human feces 03:40 in order to share the gospel with other people. 03:41 Incredible. Yeah. 03:42 And if she could take such a risk for her faith, 03:48 and if it meant so much to her, 03:50 then surely my faith should mean just as much to me 03:53 and I should be willing to go to that length 03:56 at least to help other people that have been persecuted 04:00 and to with the freedom that I have 04:02 and to stand up for them when they don't have somebody 04:04 standing up for them 04:05 or when they can't stand up for themselves. 04:07 You know, this most visceral thought that illustrates 04:09 what I've always thought about 04:11 church growth and evangelization. 04:13 Plenty of people go to seminars, 04:15 and they plot and they plan 04:17 and it's always been on that level. 04:20 An individual person telling 04:22 what's happened in their life that has power. 04:24 And the person that's really been changed 04:26 will go to any length to tell someone else 04:29 an amazing thing that's happened in their life. 04:31 Yeah, but I can say that 04:33 I wouldn't necessarily wish suffering on anyone, 04:36 and I know that there's the common phrase that, 04:39 the seed of the martyr is the-- 04:43 The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. 04:47 Yeah. But-- 04:49 Which is interred by the way. Yeah. 04:51 It just hit me, that's an interesting spin, 04:53 or may be it's the, the other spin was the other way 04:55 and on Thomas Jefferson's comment 04:57 about a blood of a few revolutionaries is necessary 05:02 for the tree of liberty. 05:03 Yeah, definitely different. 05:05 But now it's only by sacrifice that any real endeavor, 05:10 big endeavor worthwhile accomplishing 05:12 is carried forward. 05:14 So I was inspired as a young college student. 05:18 And I knew that it was a matter of faith for me 05:20 and of principle or something 05:21 God was specifically calling me to. 05:23 And I, we're all called to different things 05:25 and that just happened to be what God called me to. 05:28 And so after I left Vanguard, 05:31 I studied at the International Institute 05:32 for Human Rights in France, in Strasbourg, France, 05:35 which is where the European Court 05:36 of Human Rights is. 05:37 And I had a professor there who has become 05:41 just a great friend and mentor, 05:42 we co-authored this encyclopedia of 05:44 human rights of U.S. together recently in. 05:48 He taught me, not just human rights 05:50 but also a specific course on religious freedom 05:52 and he was teaching at a law school at the time so, 05:54 I was here an undergrad 05:56 that was just fresh out of college taking 05:58 this law school course but we became great friends 06:00 and I was so inspired by just the stories 06:05 and the passion that he portrayed 06:07 on how we can use religious freedom in International law, 06:10 that advocate for the protection of 06:12 individuals around the world, 06:13 especially for the Christians that were suffering. 06:16 So I was really inspired 06:17 and I went on to become a teacher 06:19 and I taught in Southern California but-- 06:22 What grade did you teach? 06:24 Well, I taught junior high in high school, 06:25 so I taught the hard ones, yeah. 06:27 But I loved it. 06:28 The ones that don't want to be-- 06:30 But you know what's funny is that 06:32 I taught, 8th grade, U.S. History 06:34 and so we taught the constitution, 06:35 of course they are bored to death. 06:37 But when I did a special course 06:38 on human rights it was like, a light bulb went off. 06:42 And I had this one young boy, 06:43 it was prior to 9/11 and he was from Afghanistan 06:46 and he would go around beating people up 06:48 in the hallways and so for the human rights project, 06:51 everybody got to choose what topic of human rights 06:53 they wanted to take, whether it's child trafficking 06:55 or the treating of orphans and eastern Europe 07:02 or whatever they wanted. 07:03 So what did this young man did? 07:04 Yeah, well, he didn't get a trace, 07:05 I ended up deciding for him, 07:06 and I decided that he would deal with women's rights 07:08 in Afghanistan, because I wanted to make sure-- 07:10 Not something he would naturally go to. 07:12 Naturally this little guy that goes around 07:14 beating people up, you know. 07:16 And up from Afghanistan, that is-- 07:17 Yeah, and this is right at the time, 07:20 prior to 9/11, when the Taliban 07:23 were destroying all the Buddhist artifacts 07:24 throughout Afghanistan and all the Buddhist history-- 07:27 And beating up people that flew kites 07:28 or anything like that. 07:29 Yeah, and then they were publicly stoning women 07:32 and so he took this topic, and by the end of the program, 07:36 and I was doing his part of my master's thesis 07:38 and dissertation, so I had to assess, 07:42 prior to the study and after the study, 07:44 how their ideas changed about 07:47 religious freedom and human rights. 07:49 And so the amazing thing is, at the end of the study, 07:52 this young man presents his report 07:55 on the women of Afghanistan and he writes a poem, 07:58 and I still have the poem and I-I don't know, 07:59 I can't remember, can't repeat all that for you, 08:01 but part of it, he said, it was a poem 08:04 that he wrote in a letter to president Bush. 08:06 And he said, 'Dear, President Bush, 08:07 these women are like birds in the cage 08:10 and they can't speak for themselves, 08:12 and they just need somebody to speak for them. 08:14 Will you let these women be free, 08:17 and speak for them and give them a voice?' 08:19 And I thought, wow. 08:20 This little boy used to go around beating people up, 08:22 was transformed, he developed empathy for people 08:25 and for the dignity of women and just human life. 08:30 What do you think was the catalyst, 08:32 I mean, what really? 08:33 It was the result of learning about human rights 08:35 that everybody is born with dignity, 08:38 that we're created in the image of God 08:39 and that each one of us is our brother's keeper. 08:43 And that was really the idea. 08:44 Actually when I first did the study, 08:47 it was right at the time of the Santa-- 08:49 or is it Columbine or Santa, I forget which one it was, 08:52 the attack at the high school, 08:54 there was one in Colorado and one in California, 08:57 I forget which one, 08:58 it was back then but it was I think in 2000. 09:02 It happened with this dressing at regularity almost. Yeah. 09:04 And so one of my professor's friend 09:07 from Strasbourg have come in and spoken something 09:10 about the power of words 09:11 and the power of just human dignity 09:13 and human life and how, 09:14 really how you treat an individual human being 09:17 at the very base level of, walking around campuses 09:21 and whether you're going to punch him in the face, 09:22 or respect their opinions and their beliefs, 09:24 and let them express themselves 09:26 as they would with dignity 09:28 versus the very-like far end to the spectrum, 09:32 where people are, because of words 09:36 they're offended and they lash out 09:38 and so you have this Columbine and Santa massacres 09:40 or at the other end of the spectrums even further 09:43 where you have such horrible destruction of human life, 09:47 in places like Afghanistan, and Iraq and all over the world, 09:50 that we see frequently. 09:51 But I think that the change for him, 09:53 and for many other students, 09:55 was recognizing that we live in this little bubble, 09:59 in Orange County, California. 10:01 But that the world is so much bigger 10:03 and the problems are so much bigger, 10:05 and the problems that he thought, 10:06 he experienced is this just one little student, 10:08 seemed big at the time but then we realized 10:11 that he was in big problem, 10:12 a lot worse things happening 10:14 and that he could actually do something to help this people. 10:17 I think that was the transformative moment. 10:20 Almost sounds like Casa Blanca, you know that, 10:22 two little people don't know about 10:23 there are veins in this world. 10:25 So, yeah-- 10:26 But, you know there are plenty of problems 10:28 in Orange County. 10:31 Sure. 10:32 It's not that it's problem free. 10:33 But what you did was broaden his horizons 10:36 and we need to see the real-was it Hillary Clinton, 10:40 which people have made fun of her onward. 10:41 We're a village, takes a village, 10:43 and we've got a global village, 10:44 and I think that's part of caring 10:47 for fellow human beings to see them as all over, 10:49 they're not just in your neighborhood. 10:50 Yeah. 10:51 The brotherhood of mankind, 10:53 which is not the same as globalism, 10:54 I think globalism or, you know, 10:57 false attempt to sort of smooth out the differences 10:59 to create this one entity is probably doomed it. 11:03 But we need to sense that we're all creatures 11:06 of the fellow-- you know, 11:07 fellow creatures of a creator wherever we live. 11:09 Well, I was inspired by this young man 11:11 and by-by religious freedom and human rights-- 11:13 So your student inspired you, that's what you said. 11:15 They did, they did. 11:16 Well, I knew that, I loved teaching, 11:18 I really loved it but I wanted to 11:21 experience working in this field myself 11:24 and so I decided to go, study in England 11:28 at the University of Essex which is, 11:30 a place where a lot of people 11:31 involved in International Human Rights have gone 11:33 and even my professor, friend, 11:35 that I had studied at Strasbourg with him, 11:37 had been there, 11:38 so I studied the International Human Rights Law there, 11:41 and I learned a lot about how to defend 11:45 religious freedom within many different contexts 11:48 and world views and it was a very good informative 11:51 time for me to really understand what is 11:54 that I wanted to do in the future. 11:55 So after I finished at Essex, I moved to Washington DC, 11:59 so I left California and I got a job 12:01 with the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom 12:04 where I was able to work full time on this issue. 12:06 And the neat thing is, when I was in college, 12:09 I had read, Paul Marshall's book, 12:10 'Their Blood Cries Out' about the persecution of Christians. 12:13 And it really inspired me. 12:14 And so when I went to D.C., I was able to meet Paul 12:16 and we became good friends since then and, 12:18 he's written so many books since then, 12:20 which I encourage people to read. 12:21 He is really just an inspiration 12:25 and he's done a lot to help people understand-- 12:27 I've seen that book but you reminded me in another era. 12:30 Many missionaries, because you say 12:32 you're inspired by students. 12:33 Yeah, I know many missionaries 12:34 and great evangelists are inspired 12:36 by Foxe's Book of Martyrs. 12:37 Yeah, there's something about 12:39 the testimony of others who have been, 12:41 Polly Karpin. Yes, absolutely. 12:44 And you need to contemporize a lot of this now 12:48 because right now Christians 12:50 and others of different religions, 12:52 they're giving their lives for their faith. 12:54 Yeah. It's not an abstraction. 12:55 I tell, I tell people when I'm traveling around 12:58 taking meetings on religious liberty because, 13:00 particularly some Seventh-day Adventist 13:02 who look at prophecy, you know, 13:03 one day you may be persecuted. 13:05 You know, it's happening now, 13:07 don't wait for the future, it's now. 13:09 And we need to respond and support those 13:11 and I could see that it moved you, just a loose. 13:15 Yeah, yeah. 13:16 So we're next, I am sorry to interrupted just to-- 13:18 No, no. 13:19 It's okay, I think that, you know, 13:22 there's so much to talk about but like 13:23 you were just saying, inspiring young people 13:26 and people of faith to really count the cost, 13:28 of what is it that they're believing 13:30 and following is really, 13:33 what is going to transform their lives 13:35 and their future I think. 13:38 Well, you made the difference. Yeah. 13:39 We'll be back after a break to continue this 13:41 very interesting personal odyssey from Tina, 13:45 to wish she's today, 13:47 is I believe a great leader for religious freedom. 13:50 We'll be back. |
Revised 2014-12-17