The dangers of relinquishing liberty for a quiet and “safe” life

In recent months, it has become increasingly clear that religious freedom, or any individual liberties for that matter, are best respected in lands where private property and financial resources are respected by the state.  Mark Steyn explores the themes of private property and financial responsibility in this speech describing the dangers other nations are facing when they fail to respect these boundaries.  I would encourage you to read the speech in its entirety.  Editor

The following excerpts are from a speech Mark Steyn gave at Hillsdale College on March 9, 2009.  You can read the full article here.

“In most of the developed world, the state has gradually annexed all the responsibilities of adulthood—health care, child care, care of the elderly—to the point where it’s effectively severed its citizens from humanity’s primal instincts, not least the survival instinct.”

…

“And now the last holdout, the United States, is embarking on the same grim path: After the President unveiled his budget, I heard Americans complain, oh, it’s another Jimmy Carter, or LBJ’s Great Society, or the new New Deal. You should be so lucky. Those nickel-and-dime comparisons barely begin to encompass the wholesale Europeanization that’s underway. The 44th president’s multi-trillion-dollar budget, the first of many, adds more to the national debt than all the previous 43 presidents combined, from George Washington to George Dubya. The President wants Europeanized health care, Europeanized daycare, Europeanized education, and, as the Europeans have discovered, even with Europeanized tax rates you can’t make that math add up. In Sweden, state spending accounts for 54% of GDP. In America, it was 34%—ten years ago. Today, it’s about 40%. In four years’ time, that number will be trending very Swede-like.”

…

“That’s Stage Two of societal enervation—when the state as guarantor of all your basic needs becomes increasingly comfortable with regulating your behavior. Free peoples who were once willing to give their lives for liberty can be persuaded very quickly to relinquish their liberties for a quiet life. When President Bush talked about promoting democracy in the Middle East, there was a phrase he liked to use: “Freedom is the desire of every human heart.” Really? It’s unclear whether that’s really the case in Gaza and the Pakistani tribal lands. But it’s absolutely certain that it’s not the case in Berlin and Paris, Stockholm and London, New Orleans and Buffalo. The story of the Western world since 1945 is that, invited to choose between freedom and government “security,” large numbers of people vote to dump freedom every time—the freedom to make your own decisions about health care, education, property rights, and a ton of other stuff. It’s ridiculous for grown men and women to say: I want to be able to choose from hundreds of cereals at the supermarket, thousands of movies from Netflix, millions of songs to play on my iPod—but I want the government to choose for me when it comes to my health care. A nation that demands the government take care of all the grown-up stuff is a nation turning into the world’s wrinkliest adolescent, free only to choose its record collection.

 

“And don’t be too sure you’ll get to choose your record collection in the end. That’s Stage Three: When the populace has agreed to become wards of the state, it’s a mere difference of degree to start regulating their thoughts. When my anglophone friends in the Province of Quebec used to complain about the lack of English signs in Quebec hospitals, my response was that, if you allow the government to be the sole provider of health care, why be surprised that they’re allowed to decide the language they’ll give it in? But, as I’ve learned during my year in the hellhole of Canadian “human rights” law, that’s true in a broader sense. In the interests of “cultural protection,” the Canadian state keeps foreign newspaper owners, foreign TV operators, and foreign bookstore owners out of Canada. Why shouldn’t it, in return, assume the right to police the ideas disseminated through those newspapers, bookstores and TV networks it graciously agrees to permit?

 

“When Maclean’s magazine and I were hauled up in 2007 for the crime of “flagrant Islamophobia,” it quickly became very clear that, for members of a profession that brags about its “courage” incessantly (far more than, say, firemen do), an awful lot of journalists are quite content to be the eunuchs in the politically correct harem. A distressing number of Western journalists see no conflict between attending lunches for World Press Freedom Day every month and agreeing to be micro-regulated by the state. The big problem for those of us arguing for classical liberalism is that in modern Canada there’s hardly anything left that isn’t on the state dripfeed to one degree or another: Too many of the institutions healthy societies traditionally look to as outposts of independent thought—churches, private schools, literature, the arts, the media—either have an ambiguous relationship with government or are downright dependent on it. Up north, “intellectual freedom” means the relevant film-funding agency—Cinedole Canada or whatever it’s called—gives you a check to enable you to continue making so-called “bold, brave, transgressive” films that discombobulate state power not a whit.

 

“And then comes Stage Four, in which dissenting ideas and even words are labeled as “hatred.” In effect, the language itself becomes a means of control. Despite the smiley-face banalities, the tyranny becomes more naked: In Britain, a land with rampant property crime, undercover constables nevertheless find time to dine at curry restaurants on Friday nights to monitor adjoining tables lest someone in private conversation should make a racist remark. An author interviewed on BBC Radio expressed, very mildly and politely, some concerns about gay adoption and was investigated by Scotland Yard’s Community Safety Unit for Homophobic, Racist and Domestic Incidents. A Daily Telegraph columnist is arrested and detained in a jail cell over a joke in a speech. A Dutch legislator is invited to speak at the Palace of Westminster by a member of the House of Lords, but is banned by the government, arrested on arrival at Heathrow and deported.”

MARK STEYN’S column appears in several newspapers, including the Washington Times, Philadelphia’s Evening Bulletin, and the Orange County Register. In addition, he writes for The New Criterion, Maclean’s in Canada, the Jerusalem Post, The Australian, and Hawke’s Bay Today in New Zealand.

 

Read the full article at http://www.hillsdale.edu/images/userImages/mvanderwei/Page_4221/ImprimisApril09.pdf

OPINION: O’Connor’s 4th Circuit Ruling on City Council Prayer

Historical Profile: John Wycliffe – Morning Star of the Reformation (Excerpt from Foxe’s Book of Martyrs)

One of my favorite reformers has to be John Wycliffe, who translated the language of the Latin Vulgate into language that everybody could understand.  This weekend, as part of our weekend inspirational series, we are pleased to present this excerpt from the classic, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, not because of any connection with a particular faith, but rather because Wycliffe aspired to take important text and present it to the common people, and thus to give them a voice.  Wycliffe is a hero of religious liberty and had such an impact on the world that 41 years after his death, his political detractors dug up his body, burned it, and threw his ashes into the River Swift, where they spread into larger tributaries, into the ocean, and throughout the world, symbolizing the spread of liberty that would eventually reshape Europe and ultimately build a foundation for our freedoms today. – Editor

JOHN WYCLIFFE – (~1320 – December 1384)

It will not be inappropriate to devote a few pages of this work to a brief detail of the lives of some of those men who first stepped forward, regardless of the bigoted power which opposed all reformation, to stem the time of papal corruption, and to seal the pure doctrines of the Gospel with their blood. 

Among these, Great Britain has the honor of taking the lead, and first maintaining that freedom in religious controversy which astonished Europe, and demonstrated that political and religious liberty are equally the growth of that favored island. Among the earliest of these eminent persons was John Wycliffe.

This celebrated reformer, denominated the “Morning Star of the Reformation,” was born about the year 1324, in the reign of Edward II. Of his extraction we have no certain account. His parents designing him for the Church, sent him to Queen’s College, Oxford, about that period founded by Robert Eaglesfield, confessor to Queen Philippi. But not meeting with the advantages for study in that newly established house which he expected, he removed to Merton College, which was then esteemed one of the most learned societies in Europe. 

The first thing which drew him into public notice, was his defence of the university against the begging friars, who about this time, from their settlement in Oxford in 1230, had been troublesome neighbors to the university. Feuds were continually fomented; the friars appealing to the pope, the scholars to the civil power; and sometimes one party, and sometimes, the other, prevailed. The friars became very fond of a notion that Christ was a common beggar; that his disciples were beggars also; and that begging was of Gospel institution. This doctrine they urged from the pulpit and wherever they had access. 

Wycliffe had long held these religious friars in contempt for the laziness of their lives, and had now a fair opportunity of exposing them. He published a treatise against able beggary, in which he lashed the friars, and proved that they were not only a reproach to religion, but also to human society. The university began to consider him one of their first champions, and he was soon promoted to the mastership of Baliol College. 

About this time, Archbishop Islip founded Canterbury Hall, in Oxford, where he established a warden and eleven scholars. To this wardenship Wycliffe was elected by the archbishop, but upon his demise, he was displaced by his successor, Stephen Langham, bishop of Ely. As there was a degree of flagrant injustice in the affair, Wycliffe appealed to the pope, who subsequently gave it against him from the following cause: Edward III, then king of England, had withdrawn the tribune, which from the time of King John had been paid to the pope. The pope menaced; Edward called a parliament. The parliament resolved that King John had done an illegal thing, and given up the rights of the nation, and advised the king not to submit, whatever consequences might follow. 

The clergy now began to write in favor of the pope, and a learned monk published a spirited and plausible treatise, which had many advocates. Wycliffe, irritated at seeing so bad a cause so well defended, opposed the monk, and did it in so masterly a way that he was considered no longer as unanswerable. His suit at Rome was immediately determined against him; and nobody doubted but his opposition to the pope, at so critical a period, was the true cause of his being non-suited at Rome. 

Wycliffe was afterward elected to the chair of the divinity professor:  and now fully convinced of the errors of the Romish Church, and the vileness of its monastic agents, he determined to expose them. In public lectures he lashed their vices and opposed their follies. He unfolded a variety of abuses covered by the darkness of superstition. At first he began to loosen the prejudices of the vulgar, and proceeded by slow advances; with the metaphysical disquisitions of the age, he mingled opinions in divinity apparently novel. The usurpations of the court of Rome was a favorite topic. On these he expatiated with all the keenness of argument, joined to logical reasoning. This soon procured him the clamor of the clergy, who, with the archbishop of Canterbury, deprived him of his office. 

At this time the administration of affairs was in the hands of the duke of Lancaster, well known by the name of John of Gaunt. This prince had very free notions of religion, and was at enmity with the clergy. The exactions of the court of Rome having become very burdensome, he determined to send the bishop of Bangor and Wycliffe to remonstrate against these abuses, and it was agreed that the pope should no longer dispose of any benefices belonging to the Church of England. In this embassy, Wycliffe’s observant mind penetrated into the constitution and policy of Rome, and he returned more strongly than ever determined to expose its avarice and ambition. 

Having recovered his former situation, he inveighed, in his lectures, against the pope-his usurpation-his infallibility-his pride-his avarice- and his tyranny. He was the first who termed the pope Antichrist. From the pope, he would turn to the pomp, the luxury, and trappings of the bishops, and compared them with the simplicity of primitive bishops. Their superstitions and deceptions were topics that he urged with energy of mind and logical precision. 

From the patronage of the duke of Lancaster, Wycliffe received a good benefice; but he was no sooner settled in his parish, than his enemies and the bishops began to persecute him with renewed vigor. The duke of Lancaster was his friend in this persecution, and by his presence and that of Lord Percy, earl marshal of England, he so overawed the trial, that the whole ended in disorder. 

After the death of Edward III his grandson Richard II succeeded, in the eleventh year of his age. The duke of Lancaster not obtaining to be the sole regent, as he expected, his power began to decline, and the enemies of Wycliffe, taking advantage of the circumstance, renewed their articles of accusation against him. Five bulls were despatched in consequence by the pope to the king and certain bishops, but the regency and the people manifested a spirit of contempt at the haughty proceedings of the pontiff, and the former at that time wanting money to oppose an expected invasion of the French, proposed to apply a large sum, collected for the use of the pope, to that purpose. The question was submitted to the decision of Wycliffe. The bishops, however, supported by the papal authority, insisted upon bringing Wycliffe to trial, and he was actually undergoing examination at Lambeth, when, from the riotous behavior of the populace without, and awed by the command of Sir Lewis Clifford, a gentleman of the court, that they should not proceed to any definitive sentence, they terminated the whole affair in a prohibition to Wycliffe, not to preach those doctrines which were obnoxious to the pope; but this was laughed at by our reformer, who, going about barefoot, and in a long frieze gown, preached more vehemently than before. 

In the year 1378, a contest arose between two popes, Urban VI and Clement VII which was the lawful pope, and true vicegerent of God. This was a favorable period for the exertion of Wicliffe’s talents: he soon produced a tract against popery, which was eagerly read by all sorts of people. 

About the end of the year, Wycliffe was seized with a violent disorder, which it was feared might prove fatal. The begging friars, accompanied by four of the most eminent citizens of Oxford, gained admittance to his bed chamber, and begged of him to retract, for his soul’s sake, the unjust things he had asserted of their order. Wycliffe, surprised at the solemn message, raised himself in his bed, and with a stern countenance replied, “I shall not die, but live to declare the evil deeds of the friars.” 

When Wycliffe recovered, he set about a most important work, the translation of the Bible into English. Before this work appeared, he published a tract, wherein he showed the necessity of it. The zeal of the bishops to suppress the Scriptures greatly promoted its sale, and they who were not able to purchase copies, procured transcripts of particular Gospels or Epistles. Afterward, when Lollardy increased, and the flames kindled, it was a common practice to fasten about the neck of the condemned heretic such of these scraps of Scripture as were found in his possession, which generally shared his fate. 

Immediately after this transaction, Wycliffe ventured a step further, and affected the doctrine of transubstantiation. This strange opinion was invented by Paschade Radbert, and asserted with amazing boldness. Wycliffe, in his lecture before the University of Oxford, 1381, attacked this doctrine, and published a treatise on the subject. Dr. Barton, at this time vice-chancellor of Oxford, calling together the heads of the university, condemned Wycliffe’s doctrines as heretical, and threatened their author with excommunication. Wycliffe could now derive no support from the duke of Lancaster, and being cited to appear before his former adversary, William Courteney, now made archbishop of Canterbury, he sheltered himself under the plea, that, as a member of the university, he was exempt from episcopal jurisdiction. This plea was admitted, as the university were determined to support their member. 

The court met at the appointed time, determined, at least to sit in judgment upon his opinions, and some they condemned as erroneous, others as heretical. The publication on this subject was immediately answered by Wycliffe, who had become a subject of the archbishop’s determined malice. The king, solicited by the archbishop, granted a license to imprison the teacher of heresy, but the commons made the king revoke this act as illegal. The primate, however, obtained letters from the king, directing the head of the University of Oxford to search for all heresies and books published by Wycliffe; in consequence of which order, the university became a scene of tumult. Wycliffe is supposed to have retired from the storm, into an obscure part of the kingdom. The seeds, however, were scattered, and Wycliffe’s opinions were so prevalent that it was said if you met two persons upon the road, you might be sure that one was a Lollard. At this period, the disputes between the two popes continued. Urban published a bull, in which he earnestly called upon all who had any regard for religion, to exert themselves in its cause; and to take up arms against Clement and his adherents in defence of the holy see. 

A war, in which the name of religion was so vilely prostituted, roused Wycliffe’s inclination, even in his declining years. He took up his pen once more, and wrote against it with the greatest acrimony. He expostulated with the pope in a very free manner, and asks him boldly: ‘How he durst make the token of Christ on the cross (which is the token of peace, mercy and charity) a banner to lead us to slay Christian men, for the love of two false priests, and to oppress Christiandom worse than Christ and his apostles were oppressed by the Jews? ‘When,’ said he, ‘will the proud priest of Rome grant indulgences to mankind to live in peace and charity, as he now does to fight and slay one another?’

This severe piece drew upon him the resentment of Urban, and was likely to have involved him in greater troubles than he had before experienced, but providentially he was delivered out of their hands. He was struck with the palsy, and though he lived some time, yet it was in such a way that his enemies considered him as a person below their resentment. 

Wycliffe returning within short space, either from his banishment, or from some other place where he was secretly kept, repaired to his parish of Lutterworth, where he was parson; and there, quietly departing this mortal life, slept in peace in the Lord, in the end of the year 1384, upon Silvester’s day. It appeared that he was well aged before he departed, “and that the same thing pleased him in his old age, which did please him being young.” 

Wycliffe had some cause to give them thanks, that they would at least spare him until he was dead, and also give him so long respite after his death, forty-one years to rest in his sepulchre before they ungraved him, and turned him from earth to ashes; which ashes they also took and threw into the river. And so was he resolved into three elements, earth, fire, and water, thinking thereby utterly to extinguish and abolish both the name and doctrine of Wycliffe forever. Not much unlike the example of the old Pharisees and sepulchre knights, who, when they had brought the Lord unto the grave, thought to make him sure never to rise again. But these and all others must know that, as there is no counsel against the Lord, so there is no keeping down of verity, but it will spring up and come out of dust and ashes, as appeared right well in this man; for though they dug up his body, burned his bones, and drowned his ashes, yet the Word of God and the truth of his doctrine, with the fruit and success thereof, they could not burn.

Pastors Challenge the IRS: Using the Pulpit to Promote Candidates

During this hotly contested election year, some church pastors are deliberately promoting candidates, knowing that the Internal Revenue Service could remove their tax-exempt status as the result.

In Minnesota, Pastor Gus Booth, of the Warroad Community Church, not only promoted a candidate, but wrote to the Internal Revenue Service, told them what he was doing, and dared them to investigate.  He told his parishioners that a Christian could not in good conscience support somebody like Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton.

Pastor Booth would be well within his rights to participate in political activities at church, but only if he was willing to surrender his church’s tax exempt status.  In other words, he could say whatever he wanted, but only if his congregants were willing to donate without expecting their donations to be tax-deductible.

It is indeed ironic that separation of church and state, so far as the church is concerned, ultimately is enforced by the Internal Revenue Service.

Read more about Pastor Booth and his challenge to the IRS at ABC News:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=5198068&page=1

See also Baptist Joint Committee:

http://www.bjconline.org/cgi-bin/2008/06/more_coverage_of_pulpit_initia.html#trackback

Wisconsin: Freedom from Religion Foundation Asks State to Halt Assembly Prayers

Last July, Wisconsin State Representative Terry Moulton led his colleagues in prayer:

“In your name, and by the power of your spirit, I come against the Evil One. And I ask that he be cast from this place, this day.”

Not necessarily the most ecumenical of prayers, and now the Freedom from Religion Foundation has asked the Speaker of the Assembly, Mike Huebsch, to stop official prayers on the Floor before each session.  You may remember FFRF from last year’s U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Hein v. Freedom from Religion Foundation case, which effectively, in this writer’s opinion, severely compromised the ability of individuals to use tax-payer standing to challenge Establishment Clause violations in court.

Rep. Moulton, who views his prayers as “exorcisms of the Assembly” called the Foundation “a very wacko group that is completely out of tune with mainstream America,” and said all he wanted to accomplish in the prayers was “to command that any satanic or evil forces be cast from the Assembly that day.”

Fair enough.  Read more about this story at http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080618/GPG0101/80618075/1978/GPGsports

Thought & Crime (Liberty Magazine – March/April 2008) – An Update

This evening, Mark Chipeur forwarded me the following news story that updates my previous article on Thought and Crime published in the March/April 2008 issue of Liberty magazine.

You may recall that Pastor Stephen Boissoin had gotten himself in hot water with the Alberta Human Rights Commission when he wrote a letter to the editor of the Red Deer Advocate that was critical of the “homosexual agenda.”  The community newspaper published the letter and the pastor was promptly sued.

Now we have the rest of the story.  On May 30, 2008, the Alberta Human Rights Commission issued an order that Stephen Boissoin and the Concerned Christian Coalition must pay former Red Deer school teacher Darren Lund, who had read and was offended by the letter, $5,000 in damages.

Attorney Gerald Chipeur, Mark’s brother, is handling the case and will be filing an appeal.  Read the news story at:

http://www.saultstar.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1065585

Balancing Government Secrecy and Accountability – What Should the Next President Do?

In attempting to increase national security, has the Bush administration gone too far in sacrificing accountability for secrecy? What does this mean for the next president?

The American Constitution Society (ACS) has recently published a new issue brief by Geoff Stone, entitled, On Secrecy and Transparency: Thoughts for Congress and a New Administration, in which Stone argues that the Bush administration’s insistence on national security at the expense of keeping citizens, or even Congress informed, has opened the door for torture, surveillance, and even threats to prosecute members of the press for getting too close to security issues.

In order to do so, Stone argues, the administration has relied on expansive definitions of executive immunity and the state secrets doctrine. Is it an understandable response to threats of future terrorist attacks or a fundamental shift in the way the nation works?

Stone’s document is about 12 pages long, but well worth checking out.

http://www.acslaw.org/files/Geoff%20Stone%20Issue%20Brief.pdf

NEWS BRIEFS: Global Privacy, Free Speech Issues

Study secretly tracks cell phone users outside US (AP)

Researchers secretly tracked the locations of 100,000 people outside the United States through their cell phone use and concluded that most people rarely stray more than a few miles from home.

The first-of-its-kind study by Northeastern University raises privacy and ethical questions for its monitoring methods, which would be illegal in the United States.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/06/04/national/a100140D77.DTL

Water Crisis to be Biggest World Risk (London Telegraph)

A catastrophic water shortage could prove an even bigger threat to mankind this century than soaring food prices and the relentless exhaustion of energy reserves, according to a panel of global experts at the Goldman Sachs “Top Five Risks” conference.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/06/05/ccwater105.xml

American Blogger Released on Bail in Singapore

A US-based blogger who allegedly accused a Singapore judge of “prostituting herself” was released on bail Thursday and had his passport confiscated.A judge ordered Gopalan Nair, a former Singapore lawyer who is now a US citizen, to be released on 5,000 dollars bail (3,676 US) after more than four days in custody.

A prosecutor told the court there was no need for him to be detained while further investigations were carried out.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080605082122.yhz5ise8&show_article=1