GAY RIGHTS AND OBAMA CARE PREVAIL

DATELINE WASHINGTON D.C… JULY 4TH. 2015…THE UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS GAY RIGHTS AND OBAMA CARE’S FEDERAL SUBSIDIES FOR THE POOR.

Someone once said change comes slowly, but, in the end, it comes awfully fast. This time, change has come so fast it accelerated well past the emotional speed limit of many well intentioned, God fearing American citizens. After the long climb to the top of the mountain, the arduous legal ordeal is over and the Supreme Court of the United States has taken the cultural warriors of America into the 21st. Century by judicially declaring that ‘‘Gay Marriage’’ and “Federally subsidized’’ Obama care for the poor are here to stay. In short, “Gay Marriage’’ and “health care subsidies’’ for the poor are the Law of the Land.

One view (which I champion) says the United States Supreme Court has correctly adopted the message of “inclusiveness’’ by “including’’ Gay Rights in the panoply of human rights in America and also by “including’’ America’s poorest citizens (the “common man’’ and the “forgotten woman’’) in the group of American citizens who have access to medical care. Another view (the one I don’t champion) from well intention and God fearing citizens says that the Supreme Court has destroyed the religious rights of others who believe that “gayness’’ is a free will “choice’’ that opposes their own religiously held beliefs and dogma, and that providing medical care to America’s poorest is nothing less than “socialism’’ that attacks the very fabric of our economic engine of “capitalism’’ (kinda like the “socialism for the rich’’ that former president, George W. Bush, and the American Congress handed out in 2008 when they gave a $750 billion of taxpayer’s TARP funds to rescue the “too big to fail’’ Wall Street investment banks).

Today, this July 4th, 2015 (after the Supreme Court rulings on ‘‘Gay rights’’ and Federally subsidized health care for the poor), I am bursting with pride just to be an American citizen living in a country where unprovable, religious “beliefs,’’ “opinions’’ and “dogma’’ do not trump the God given, human rights of society’s marginalized castoffs… the poor and the sexually different. This July 4th, I get down on my knees and say a prayer of thanks. May the ISIS mentality of “exclusion’’ of others on the basis of religious dogma and belief never reach the shores of my beloved America.

To those well intentioned citizens of America who do not think as I do, I very respectfully suggest that they may be overlooking the “lessons of history’’ and the well documented loss of rights, liberties and freedom that history teaches us occurs when any (repeat for emphasis “any’’) religious group pushes to have their religious “beliefs’’ and their unprovable religious “dogma’’ adopted as the law of the land… whether those groups be ISIS or whether they be Christian groups who push to have their biblical or canon law interpretations adopted as the law of the land.

SECULAR OBJECTIONS TO RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND DOGMA BECOMING THE LAW OF THE LAND… AKA “SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE’’:

It is religious “superiority’’ (in unprovable dogma) that led the Christian hierarchy to threaten Galileo with death unless he recanted his (scientifically correct) theory that the sun was the center of the Universe. It is religious “superiority’’ (in unprovable dogma) that led to the high school teacher in the Scopes Monkey trial being charged with and convicted of a crime in Tennessee (despite the intervention of great Trial Lawyer, Clarence Darrow) because the teacher taught Darwin’s theory of “evolution’’ in the classroom… which many “believed’’ was contrary to “dogma’’ in the Bible’s story of Adam and Eve (later reconciled by Catholic Pope Pius the 12th in a 1950’s document stating that evolution and the biblical story of Adam and Eve were compatible). It is this very type of religious “superiority’’ (in unprovable dogma) that led to the crucifixion and death of an innocent Jesus for blasphemy (and sedition) because Jesus claimed to be the son of God.

SPIRITUAL OBJECTIONS TO RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND DOGMA BECOMING THE LAW OF THE LAND… AKA “INCLUSION’’ OF THE OUTCASTS:

Any religious group that pushes to have their religious “dogma’’ and “beliefs’’ adopted as the law of the land is a clear and present danger and a real threat to the rights, liberties and freedom of all of us. I criticize no one for their religious beliefs, but, to safeguard our own “unalienable’’ and “God given’’ rights, liberties and freedom, we must insist that religious beliefs of unprovable dogma (our own and everyone else’s) never be forced on other citizens as the law of the land.

Christianity traces its roots to Jesus of Nazareth, a man whose earthly life is a case study in “inclusion’’ of society’s outcasts. Think of Mary Magdelen “included’’ as a friend in the inner circle of the apostles’ “mens only’’ club. Think of the woman adulterer who was being stoned prompting Jesus to say: “he who is without sin throw the first stone.’’ Think of the tax collector Matthew, chosen as an apostle by Jesus (when anyone collecting taxes for Rome-the-oppressor was roundly condemned and hated in the land of the Jews). Think of the good Samaritan story (when Samaritans were hated by Jews). Think of the unthinkable… Jesus touching the unclean Leper who no one else would dare touch. Think of the forgiveness of the thief on the cross with Jesus including the thief in the kingdom of the next world. Think of the words of Jesus in Matthew 25: 35–36: When I was hungry, you gave me to eat, thirsty, you gave me to drink, imprisoned, you visited me… one and all marginalized outcasts of society, yet all “included’’ in the protective mantle of Jesus’ love, and in Pope Francis’ recent, indelible sentiment: “Who am I to Judge’’???

Yes I am proud to be an American when the Supreme Court stands up for sexual minorities (gay marriage) and the poor (medical care) and gives them the same rights as others and “includes’’ the poor and the (law abiding) sexually different within the protective mantle of “inclusion’’ and American freedom. Happy fourth of July to all Americans… especially this 4th of July. And, God bless and give eternal joy to our former “Depression Era’’ President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt… the hero of working class America, and never forget the sorrow of the ‘‘common man’’ who broke down in tears as President Roosevelt’s funeral procession passed by him on the way to sacred ground: “I didn’t know President Roosevelt, but he knew me.’’

Fred Lauck
Contact Fred

Saturday, July 25, 2015