Morality, Religion & Philosophy: April 2009 Archives
A poll mentioned here by the Associated Baptist Press reflects a profound misunderstanding by the pollsters and the ABP journalist about both "torture" and Biblical doctrine.
A new survey suggests the very Americans who claim to follow the Bible most assiduously don’t consult it when forming their views about torture and government policy.The poll of 600 Southern white evangelicals was released Sept. 11 in Atlanta in connection with a national religious summit on torture. It shows not only are white evangelical Southerners more likely than the general populace to believe torture is sometimes or often justified, but also that they are far more likely—to tweak a phrase from Proverbs—to “lean on their own understanding” regarding the subject.
However, their views seemed to change when asked to consider torture policy in light of the Golden Rule. When respondents were asked if the United States should “never use methods against our enemies that we would not want used on American soldiers,” more than half agreed.
It's bizarre to imply that Jesus' Sermon on the Mount was intended as public policy prescriptions when Jesus himself had very little to say about politics or government at all. Jesus' instructions were for us as individuals and clearly had no bearing on how war should be carried out. We don't want al Qaeda to hunt us down and kill us, so does that mean we shouldn't do it to them? No, absurd.
I guess the source of the poll and the quoted discussion is informative.
The study was commissioned by Mercer University and Faith in Public Life. Its results were announced during the “Religious Faith, Torture and our National Soul” conference held on Mercer’s Atlanta campus. The meeting was sponsored by the two organizations that commissioned the poll and a host of other religious groups, including the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Evangelicals for Human Rights, the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference and the Islamic Society of North America.
Completely neglected is any discussion of the now-loaded word "torture": most poll respondents were probably aware that the term is often used to describe practices that most people would not actually consider to be "torture" but merely unpleasant. By warping the meaning of the word to broaden its definition and hinder the War on Terror, the Left has simultaneously enabled the creation of absurd polls whose results are essentially meaningless.
I encourage Robert Marus and the Associated Baptist Press to be a bit more skeptical and deep-thinking before writing these sorts of nonsensical stories.
From The Voice of the Martyrs:
TURKEY- Pray for Turkey on April 18The Turkish church has set aside April 18 as the International Day of Prayer for Turkey. VOM encourages you to pray for believers in Turkey who are risking their lives for Christ. Especially remember the families of Necati Aydin, Tilman Geske and Ugur Yuksel who were martyred on April 18, 2007 in Malatya, Turkey. Ask God to continue encouraging their families and for believers in Turkey to remain faithful and courageous despite persecution.
This paper in the British Medical Journal proves that abortion is used as a sex-selection tool in China thanks to the totalitarian one-child policy and general discrimination against girls and women.
Results 4 764 512 people under the age of 20 were included. Overall sex ratios were high across all age groups and residency types, but they were highest in the 1-4 years age group, peaking at 126 (95% confidence interval 125 to 126) in rural areas. Six provinces had sex ratios of over 130 in the 1-4 age group. The sex ratio at birth was close to normal for first order births but rose steeply for second order births, especially in rural areas, where it reached 146 (143 to 149). Nine provinces had ratios of over 160 for second order births. The highest sex ratios were seen in provinces that allow rural inhabitants a second child if the first is a girl. Sex selective abortion accounts for almost all the excess males. One particular variant of the one child policy, which allows a second child if the first is a girl, leads to the highest sex ratios.Conclusions In 2005 males under the age of 20 exceeded females by more than 32 million in China, and more than 1.1 million excess births of boys occurred. China will see very high and steadily worsening sex ratios in the reproductive age group over the next two decades. Enforcing the existing ban on sex selective abortion could lead to normalisation of the ratios.
Emphasis mine.
Shouldn't various groups concerned about "women's rights" be making a bit of noise about this ruthless gender-cide?
(HT: William Saletan.)
