Maybe he's having second thoughts. Maybe my letter got some doubts going. Unlikely, but I can hope.
Whatever the reason, Ron Brown, assistant football coach of the Nebraska Cornhuskers and fiery, born-again preacher, backed out of the opportunity to make national headlines again this week. Citing a media frenzy, he declined to testify against a Fairness Ordinance up before the City Council in my adopted and beloved hometown of Lincoln, Neb.
Brown caused an uproar when he testified in Omaha in March, giving his address as the University of Nebraska's Memorial Stadium and more-or-less threatening the Council members with damnation if they passed a similar ordinance protecting LGBT minorities from housing and employment discrimination. They did.
Brown's appearance before the Omaha council was positively sedate compared with how he performs in front of his fellow fundamentalists. If you have time, check him out in this video clip, condemning "the culture" of freedom in America, calling for theocratic domination and skating close to the line of inciting violence. It's breathtaking.
But this week Brown, who rarely passes up a chance to preach, whether in classrooms, rightwing radio, cable TV or public hearings, sent a comparatively meek letter to the local paper. While I applaud the uncharacteristically tolerant sentiments Brown expresses in his letter, I was frankly disappointed that I did not get the chance to confront him before the City Council.
Just as Ron Brown believes that the Bible is an inerrant guide to life, I am convinced that he and his ilk are sadly deluded, and that their reactionary efforts to drag civilization back into the Dark Ages pose a danger to us all. But there is a particular irony in Brown's case, one that I tried to bring to his attention in my email. By choosing to interpret the Bible to suit his prejudice, Brown, an African American, is committing the same kind of bigotry that slavers and Jim Crow supporters engaged in for centuries.
A key point of my testimony to Lincoln's City Council was this: in every age and with every Scripture people interpret the messages to suit their needs, desires and fears. Indeed, it cannot be otherwise. The plain language of the commandment "Thou Shalt Not Kill," taken literally, would condemn everyone to starvation. We are not autotrophs. The cells of plants, fungi or animals must die that we may live.
Unconstrued, the words of Jesus in Matthew 16:28 would mean that every Christian after the first generation should have lost faith: "Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom." Interpretation makes it possible for Christianity to survive. But it also gives cover to evil.
Today, a handful of verses that refer to men "lying" with men form the basis for an anti-gay crusade. But until recently, Genesis 9 starred in Bible-based public policy debates. Genesis 9:18-27 tells the bizarre story of Noah going on a binge and waking up to find that his son Ham saw him naked while he was in a drunken stupor. Noah reacts by placing an eternal curse on his own grandson, making Ham's youngster Canaan a slave to Noah's other sons Shem and Japheth. Unless you interpret this as an allegory, it makes no sense. Yet, once you start interpreting, there's no limit. Indeed, generations of white Christians relied on the Curse of Ham to rationalize one of the great crimes of history: the enslavement of millions of Africans.
In his exhaustive study "Noah's Curse: The Biblical Justification of American Slavery," religious scholar Stephen R. Haynes writes of "the central role of Noah's curse in the antebellum proslavery argument." He quotes an 1836 tract as one of many instances:
It appears from Genesis IX, 25, 26, and 27, that when there was but one family on the face of the earth, a part of that family was doomed, by the father Noah, to become slaves to the others. That part was the posterity of Ham... (Haynes, pp. 70-71)
Its ruling in the notorious Dred Scott case turns on the myth that proof of Noah's curse lay in the dark skin of Africans: "The unhappy black race," Chief Justice Roger Taney wrote on behalf of the court, was "separated from the white by indelible marks." Convinced that God was on his side, Taney went on to affirm that blacks were "beings of an inferior order... altogether unfit to associate with the white race ... and so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect."
Now, you may think that's ancient history. But the Curse of Ham has been invoked on the Senate floor during Ron Brown's lifetime. Again, from Haynes' study:
[I]n his contribution to a 534-hour Senate filibuster against the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia read ... Genesis 9:18-27 into the Congressional Record, remarking that "Noah apparently saw fit to discriminate against Ham's descendants in that he placed a curse upon Canaan."
Here is where science can help. Slavery, racism, anti-gay bigotry all spring from the same source: moral prejudice. Science has teased them apart from moral reasoning. Moral prejudices derive from our reflex responses of fear, disgust or anger.
We have a moral (and evolutionarily useful) prejudice against rats, and so we fix that label on people we believe to be sneaky and vicious. Moral prejudices also ignite xenophobia, homophobia and violence -- all qualities that might have given a survival edge to tribal peoples living in a lawless age but which lack any moral justification whatsoever in our time. Moral reasoning, on the other hand, begins with compassion and moves on to a systematic consideration of all available evidence.
Let's be honest: For many people, equal rights for gays is a brainer. But that's the point: To be a moral person, you must engage in the hard work of moral reasoning. It leads to a clear conclusion: Anti-gay bigotry is as unjust as racism. Can Scripture be helpful in the process? Sure, if it prompts reflection, displaces selfishness, and inspires humility, compassion, forgiveness and altruism.
To Mr. Brown, I say: If you stick with the path you are on, you must either accept all of the Bible's morally atrocious directives, including slavery, genocide and child-murder, or none of 'em. To do otherwise would be to act as a hypocrite. A better way remains open. You can join the millions of Christians who, remembering the words of Jesus in Matthew 7:1, unconditionally welcome their gay brothers and sisters: "Judge not, that ye be not judged."
Follow Clay Farris Naff on Twitter: www.twitter.com/claynaff
The acceptance of same sex marriage takes us back to the time of Nero and Elagabalus who both married same sex partners.
Nero, who ruled in St. Pauls time married three different men at three differnt times. He had a wedding and wore a veil.
Elagabalus liked to wear makeup according to Cassius Dio & prance around soliciting. Hierocles he referred to as his husband.
You will remember Nero had Paul decapitated.
So now you want the Christian Community to embrace Nero's life style?
I'll stick with St. Paul and what he discribed as the Christian lifstyle.
By the way, how did the God who emphasized social justice, even in the Old Testament morph into a prissy, prudish, celestial Mrs. Grundy?
This issue is the civil rights issue of our time and we need to get it right, where it goes from here is to expose bigotry and intolerance. The problem with the debate is the starting point and direction,it often ends up as a circular and bi-polar debate where there can be no resolution. I have one suggestion and that is from the Bible,can we start here, John 14:6 "Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth and the life,no man comes to the Father but by me." PEACE
The scriptures allow Christians to judge. However, the necessary standard is to not be a hypocrite in judging. The real mystery is "why" some people will use the God of the Bible in claiming they know God's real intentions, although, not supported by scripture.
In other words, you originally learned about God from the scripture. Yet, now You know God's will outside of the scripture. And, to use racism as a ploy to deflect an African American's stance on homosexuality will never be successful. Why? Because, African Americans feel like this is an attempt to toy with their intelligence and is disengenuous. Plus, it comes across as telling an African American that they are not smart enough to really understand the Bible...and, that my friend is a racist insult.
Both were accounts of the same worldwide flood.
The Genesis account is absolutely true and was written down during the Exodus of the Jewish people from Egypt. The Babylonian account was written later; its author may have copied elements from the Hebrew story while they were held captivity.
LGBT, it's own science has proven that this sin is a chosen lifestyle not in anyway a gene factor. This we can all call another myth or Epic of Gilgamesh.
He's not acting: he's the real deal.
Those folks love their football team and the bibles and their, ok that is it, their football team comes first then their bibles. :-)
Its all about the power, little else.
Science demands power to conform humanity to its "ideals".
Religion demands the same.
Both of them are pretty dumb and fantastical, and to be polite, factually limited.
Interestingly if one were to take stock of religion, would it bear resemblance to what was in fact intended, Now if God were the "author" as is commonly claimed by many. what would happen if God indeed showed up?
If I could prove the existence of God, who would try to stop me first?
Religion or science?
One of these days il have to sit down and read the bible.
Judgement #1 if i never said anything?
They both have cherished beliefs and ideologies to protect at all costs.
Or as my favorite preacher states: jesus is the only way. this preacher was raised by a strict christian fundamentalist and it has never dawned on him that if he had been raised buddhist or hindu or muslim he would be saying exactly what his parents taught him to say.
Amazing how conditioned cherished beliefs can control our very thoughts about reality.
How does treating as allegory make it any more sensible? What moral lesson does this teach?
If your father gets drunk, look the other way even if he does something stupid?
Never enter your father's bedroom?
If you see your father naked, do not cover him up. If he catches pneumonia, he deserves it?
If your father has a drinking problem, pretend not to notice?
This story only makes sense if Noah himself wrote it - while he was still hung over.
Thanks for reading and commenting.
Clay
I have never heard this before. Could you post a link describing this archaeological evidence?
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The book actually is about a mock trial and you will be suprised at the outcome. PEACE
All humans with ideologies and beliefs cherry pick to support their beliefs and ideologies.