If you know anything about me, you know that I try my hardest to steer clear of political debates, online or off. However, this newest Glenn Beck twaddle really chaps my hide. Here’s what you might have missed:
On his daily radio and television shows last week, Glenn Beck set out to convince his audience that “social justice,” the term many Christian churches use to describe their efforts to address poverty and human rights, is a “code word” for communism and Nazism. Beck urged Christians to discuss the term with their priests and to leave their churches if leaders would not reconsider their emphasis on social justice.
“I’m begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them . . . are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”
Now you can be on either side of the political isle, and debate your entire lifetime on whether or not it’s good for the government to be involved in helping the poor, but let me make one thing crystal clear… that is exactly what the church is here for. We are to be the hands and feet of Jesus, giving food to those that are hungry, helping those in need, practicing “the religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless … looking after orphans and widows in their distress.”
What Glenn is doing here is taking a hot political issue and trying to sound pious while tugging at the emotions of his followers. He’s (mis)using religion to effect legitimate political discord… and to make a name for himself. I thought Glenn jumped the shark quite a while back, but this solidifies my decision to steer clear of this ignorant fear monger. I’d urge you to do the same.
And for the record, I want no part of any organization, religion, or church that does not take seriously our mandate to help those in need—spiritually AND physically.
Filed under: Glenn Beck, Social Justice
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