Welcome back to
the Liberty Insider.
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Before the break
with Charles Mills,
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I was vexing,
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I don't know if
eloquence that you can say that.
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Eloquence, that's
the only way you vex.
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With vexing vehement about
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what I see is a
dangerous model of talking
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about the common good,
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and of course that
minimizes the individual
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and those out of the mainstream
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who are insisting on
their view even though,
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you know, they hold it deeply
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but it's
troublesome for the aggregate.
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It just begs the
question, the common good.
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Who determines the common good?
Of course, that's the point.
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And when you're
talking about religion,
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when you deal with that sort
of generic sort of religion,
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it will be in fact
as I about to say that,
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I think of Ellen White,
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our visionary in
the Adventist Church.
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She wrote about
this and she said
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the leading churches
of the United States.
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So the mainline or
mainstream religions
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were probably sort of--
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Now, get together
might be term misstatement,
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but there's a
common agreement that yes,
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we hold this,
we're a Christian nation,
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we believe in God
and it sounds like
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the apostles' creed I guess.
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But, you know,
we believe in God,
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we believe in Sunday keeping,
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Adventist don't
but, you know, most do.
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We believe in morality
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where you love your
neighbor and do this.
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And, you know,
and the person here
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that believes in, you know,
golden plates from the ground,
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that's a bit strange
that we won't count those.
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That's how that happens I think.
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And in another
word that our views
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but you don't
hear it much before,
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it's the
syncretistic religious viewpoint
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or as Tony Palmer in
that much published broadcast
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where he had the pope give
a message to the charismatics.
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The pope said
and Tony both said,
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you know,
doctrine is not important,
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we unite on love and fellowship.
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Well, it's the half truth,
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so taking a half truth
and we all join together
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and then loosely agree
on this generic doctrines
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and then anyone that
holds too aggressively
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to something different
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is not working
for the common good.
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Now, while we're on this topic,
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what are your thoughts on this
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recent development
of the Catholic Church
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and the
evangelicals getting together
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and just sort of patting
each other on the back like
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they're old good buddies?
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Well, on the point
of human interaction,
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it's wonderful.
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We were supposed to
do that as Christian.
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Yeah, we need to
be careful, you know,
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it's their right
and more than a right,
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you know, they come by
all world around is admirable.
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If the pope stop by
my house for supper,
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I would not throw him
out. I would be friendly.
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Come on in, have a
seat. Have some veggie burger.
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Have a little chitchat with him.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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But if that is the
basis for moving on
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or sort of
amalgamating it to some sort of,
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you know,
corporate church entity now
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that's replaced these
things I would be unhappy
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because there are
very real differences
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that gave rise to the
Protestant Revolution--
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Reformation.
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And some of the...
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Yeah, well, I laughed at it
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'cause I thought it
was rather appropriate.
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Yes. Exactly.
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No, we got to be careful
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that we shouldn't be such naysay
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as that nice good
Christian contacts between,
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in this case Christians
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or amicable contacts
say between Christians,
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and Muslims and
Buddhists which I'm part of.
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Sure. Absolutely.
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Now, some of our
own Adventist members
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are little unhappy when
we have dialogues like that.
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We need to talk
with anyone that will
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and share our faith with
anyone that will listen to us.
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But the danger
of course with this
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is we know what it represents.
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There's a compromise on
one side and Tony Palmer,
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I thought rather
gleefully told those people
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that the reformation has ended
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because the Lutherans
have signed their life away,
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well, maybe they compromised.
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But the reformation
shouldn't have been ended
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and even if it had that doesn't
negate the deeply held views
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that gave rise to it.
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So they are willing to sort
of deny history along the way,
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and some of the worst
troubles of the Middle Ages
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were from this
monolithic church viewpoint
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that then turnaround
and once the come by hour
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approach to
complexity initial joining,
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then they were turned out
to be very intolerant of those
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that were outside that fold.
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So that's the danger in it.
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It comes from an
understanding a prophecy
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that we're directly told if
you read the Bible carefully
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that this sort of thing
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where people give
away their minds for a time
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to this giant religia of
politic power and bad things
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and even
persecution will come from it.
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And we've talked
about this before, Lincoln.
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Why stop it?
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If the Bible
says it's gonna happen
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and praise the
Lord, it's happening now,
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that means God is coming soon.
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Why stand on the way
when I just of push it along?
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Well.
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Yes, that's fatalism and
we're not fatalist, is it?
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The Muslims are not
quite fatalistic either
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but, you know,
they're known for Inshallah,
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God willing.
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But even that is
really more under
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what Islam is the subservience,
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your submission,
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you're being
submissive to Allah,
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it doesn't mean that it's
going to happen regardless.
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Certainly in Islam but
absolutely in Christianity
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there is our actions
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that interact with
God's sovereign will
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and we're agents
to make things happen
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and if we slow
down, it doesn't happen
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or it doesn't
happen when it should,
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so it's a dynamic and yeah,
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I've said before that
there might be come a time,
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in fact will come a
time in the United States
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where though we're
not only intolerance
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but avert gross persecution,
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but it doesn't
have to happen now.
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And why would we
want it to happen now,
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even though I'm very
big on pilgrim's progress.
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And pilgrim makes his way
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through all sorts of
trials and tribulations,
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lions and beelzebub in
the city of destruction
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or it leaves the
city of destruction
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but vanity fair and so on.
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But I don't see at any point
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that he is in a great
rush to get across Jordan.
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In fact Jordan
which is emblematic of him
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dying is his great
test and he feels at point
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he can't make it and so on.
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That's the chasm
between this life
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and the next that people
are always very cautions on.
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But that whole life you
see progressively got into
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was living in hope
and expectation of that,
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so we're the same.
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Of course, we
want a better world,
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but we live in this
world and we've an obligation
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to work in this case
for religious freedom,
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for the freedom of conscience.
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We have an
obligation to work for peace
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and prosperity for
all of our fellows.
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Purely because we're here
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with other
creatures of the Creator God.
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Why would we want something
for ourselves and not for them?
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And if we are on
the right track now
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and we're suddenly
plucked into heaven.
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Well, where would that
lead us that don't know God?
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Right, we should
be under obligation
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to bring in the common
good, to turn it on its head.
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Hobby Lobby highlighted
a real conundrum for us,
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because on the one hand
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we want to have employee rights,
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on the other hand we want
to have him employer rights.
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We have the workplace, what,
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Workplace Freedom
Act, what's that called?
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Workplace Religious Freedom Act.
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Religious Freedom Act.
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We're trying to say--
We're trying to say it's--
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Yeah, we're trying to say
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it's okay for
you to do something
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but I don't agree with totally.
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And it's-- we need
to, we need to keep that
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from happening
unless I agree with it.
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So there is a circle going here
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that we're having a hard
time with in these events
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that are happening today.
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Well, we're having
a hard time with it,
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but I don't why such a
hard time to be honest,
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because the
requirement under Obama Care
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which I'm not here to
defend all that I say.
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We don't want
people to use devices
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that kill infant children.
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We don't want that to happen.
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But we want to give
them the right to do that.
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Even on this program I
think I've made comments,
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someone originally
came from Australia
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that sort of
pitiful that in the US
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is such heavy
debate about applying
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some sort of
general health insurance.
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Every western country has
it except the United States,
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but that's another question.
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But I wish there was
more empathy for those
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who are not
insured when they apply.
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That seems to be absent.
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But once we have this Obama Care
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it required that employees
provide healthcare insurance
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which is not, you know,
particularly unique idea.
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It does not require
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that the
employee have an abortion.
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It does not require
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that they use some
sort of contraceptive
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that crosses the line, you know,
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the morning after pill
or something like that.
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Doesn't require it.
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That's where I think
there's the disconnect
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in the thinking here.
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It doesn't require
it anymore than by me
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paying my tax to send
which funds the government
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to go off and do some things
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that I'm scan set all
sorts of education programs,
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all sorts of subsidy save
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for teaching
evolution in public schools.
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There's many, many things
that are done on my dollar
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through the public
that I'm uncomfortable with,
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but why this line of causality
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should be then
made so objectionable.
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It does trouble me a little bit.
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It does trouble me.
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Where as to take it away,
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I've immediately
allowed the employer
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to make that moral
choice for someone else
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who may not, may
have all along been ready
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to make the right
choice but why should,
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what right did they have to say,
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no, you can't even
exercise that choice.
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When the God that I serve
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lets us choose the
wrong things on occasion.
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Makes us choose badly. Yes.
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I mean we often do choose badly.
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But at the same time
and I'm glad you heard this
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'cause the God that we
serve, can a corporation,
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or how would a corporation
be it like a God that we serve.
00:10:04.35\00:10:08.26
Can they do that?
Should they even try?
00:10:08.29\00:10:12.94
No, I mean, there
are lot of arcane,
00:10:12.97\00:10:15.24
we're not always arcane,
00:10:15.27\00:10:16.30
but some very complex
legal issues that play here
00:10:16.33\00:10:19.13
but I do thing it's
a dangerous shift away
00:10:19.16\00:10:22.41
from the rights
of the individual
00:10:22.44\00:10:23.96
to the rights of the business
and Seventh-day Adventist,
00:10:23.99\00:10:28.42
if you and I
started the business,
00:10:28.45\00:10:29.88
we know right away we'll have
a conflict in the workplace.
00:10:29.91\00:10:32.47
Are we going to
keep our business
00:10:32.50\00:10:33.72
open on our holy day, Saturday?
00:10:33.75\00:10:35.65
And I'm very happy
to see that Chicka Filla
00:10:35.68\00:10:39.51
for example is closed on Sunday
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because that's the
commitment of the employees,
00:10:41.13\00:10:43.59
but they have not
harmed anyone else,
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they have just
deprived themselves of income.
00:10:45.15\00:10:48.26
So yes, you take the cost
00:10:48.29\00:10:50.98
but you deal
with the marketplace.
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Religious liberty
is such a complex issue
00:10:53.31\00:10:56.31
and there are so many questions
00:10:56.34\00:10:57.81
and that's what
we try to talk about
00:10:57.84\00:10:58.99
on this program
also in Liberty Magazine.
00:10:59.02\00:11:01.99
We'll continue to
do that and we hope
00:11:02.02\00:11:03.40
that you'll continue to watch.
00:11:03.43\00:11:04.47
Thank you.
00:11:04.50\00:11:06.80
When they follow
Jesus, they sub--
00:11:06.83\00:11:09.96
submerged all of
their personal interests
00:11:09.99\00:11:12.81
in His mission, in His kingdom.
00:11:12.84\00:11:15.50
That was really when any of them
00:11:15.53\00:11:20.44
departed from that,
that we had trouble.
00:11:20.47\00:11:22.56
When Judas
keeping the money decided
00:11:22.59\00:11:26.07
that money was more
important than mission,
00:11:26.10\00:11:28.14
that's when Jesus'
very life is at risk.
00:11:28.17\00:11:31.16
And I think too when
we look at Hobby Lobby
00:11:31.19\00:11:33.64
and the legal
case that follows that.
00:11:33.67\00:11:36.46
Yes, those people are following
their conscience in Christ.
00:11:36.49\00:11:40.68
But if business
is allowed to mix
00:11:40.71\00:11:44.30
with civil affairs too much,
if business, religious business
00:11:44.33\00:11:50.36
is enabled to
become a secular concern.
00:11:50.39\00:11:55.53
I think we might
see religion projected
00:11:55.56\00:11:59.14
in the wrong way on society.
00:11:59.17\00:12:03.14
For Liberty Insider,
this is Lincoln Steed.
00:12:03.17\00:12:06.38