[Granville-Hough] 11 Feb 2010 - Uncivil Disobedience

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2010 08:36:23 -0800
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: Uncivil Disobedience- 11 Feb 2021

    Back in November, a group of Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox 
leaders released a "declaration reminding fellow believers that 
Christianity has taught that civil disobedience is not only permitted, 
but sometimes required.  Then, after invoking Dr. Martin Luther King, 
the 152 signers specifically proclaim  anathema on  those who would 
enact laws protecting abortion or extending the rights of civil (not 
religious) marriage to same-sex couples.  They then said, "because we 
honor justice and the common good, we will not comply with any edict 
that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, 
embryo-destructive research, assisting suicide and euthanasia, or any 
other anti-life act, , nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force 
us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the 
equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about 
morality and immorality...We will fully and ungrudgingly render to 
Caesar what is Caesar's.  But under no circumstance will we render to 
Caesar what is God's."
    This way of thinking was brought out by two incidents, one related 
to my church and the other to my daily messages. 
    The one related to my daily messages I would call the "Our 
President," issue.  It came from a middle-aged man who objected to my 
reference that I would support "our President," as he struggled with 
problems of inherited wars, neglected health care, and an outdated 
financial structure.  He emphatically returned a message that Barack 
Obama was NOT his president.  Well, he is telling that to an Army 
officer who served from 1942 into 1969, then was subject to recall until 
he was 62.  There were many Presidents with whom I disagreed, but we 
only had one at the time.  No matter what his name, he was our 
Commander-in-Chief, and we served at his beck and call.  Then there was 
a diatribe about our President's appointees to which I made a comparison 
to a former official from the previous administration.  To this, the 
correspondent asked me to remove him from all my mailing lists.  Which, 
of course, I did.
    Last fall, we had an accomplished evangelist come to our church, and 
was inspiring to all up to a question period in which he added an 
off-hand remark that he thought Our President, Barack Obama was a 
Muslim.  I had seen that remark several times and thought it 
demonstrated ignorance at a most basic level.  Where, in the 
Constitution does it even suggest that Our President must be a 
Christian?  We have had some of very questionable beliefs as far as 
being a practicing Christian is concerned.  Would I have served in the 
Army under a Muslim President?.  Absolutely!!  .If the people of the 
United States  elected him , he was "Our President" and Commander-in-Chief.
    Getting back to the November declaration, I will use Quaker terms, 
with apologies to my dear current pastors.  How does it happen that 152 
"hireling ministers" or any other number, define the nature of God? 
Would it not be better to use the words of a former pope, "It is very 
hard to know the will of God?"  How will we solve some of our earthly 
problems if we fail to make use of all God's laws that we can learn about?
    This is a sermon about human knowledge and experience.  It asks you 
the question: Where do you stand on the issues on which Humanity may 
rise or fall?
Think carefully, for I believe we will all find there is but one Earth.  
If we want to reach a place called Heaven, it will not be on Mars or the 
Moon.  It must be on this Earth where we have learned to live by God's 
will.  If we do not preserve Earth,  what is the alternative?  Grandpa Hough