Um, Christianity already has free will
It was founded on the principle, in fact.
Stephen Boisson, Alberta Public Enemy #1 and recipient of future-crime complaints because of his Christian stance on homosexuality, brings us a surreal conversation with a Human Rights Commission employee.
He said the following recommendations were the responsibility of the people who invited me, not my responsibility.
2. Ask the church to get a signed consent form from everyone, parents and children, everyone, stating that they are not forced to attend and are there of their own free will. Later he added that this consent should be drawn up by a lawyer who is familiar with the Human Rights Laws.
3. The weekend retreat is considered one-occasion situation and that a license was probably not required.
4. The church needs to contact the education people and take a curriculum of the program and demonstrate that it is an educational program that is not unwelcome by the group there and everyone is there by consent. Also, the church needs to ask the education people if a license is required. At this point Ralph was uncertain and seemed to think a license would be helpful if problems occurred.
5. The church needs to contact the police to make sure they do not view the program as bordering on criminal activity—need to show them the curriculum so they know what is going on and do not arrive on the scene.
WTF? With the exception of the occasional 8-year-old who would probably prefer to be at home playing Wii, people are usually at church or any church program by their own free will. There aren’t people herding them in at gunpoint.
I then told Ralph that the church had already distributed a CD of mine to each of their families to prepare for the retreat that had some statements on it about homosexuals. He said that they needed a consent form from each family that this was not unwelcome material and that their kids would not be talking about any of it in the schools.
He said, “You may have a problem with the CD if it is seen as gay bashing and if anyone who has it displays it before the public, i.e., talking about it in a classroom. It needs to be used by a select group who consented to receiving the material. Religious material must not be forced on anyone who is not a part of the group who consented. If a student did this, and the person complained, you would be liable and it would not matter that all the safeguards were in place.”
Again, that free will thing. But even more worrying, what is this about keeping teachings secret and not talking about them with others? Is it now official policy of the Alberta Human Rights Commission to drive Christianity underground? Are we in Iran, where Christian teachings must be done in basements and behind closed curtains, never letting the neighbors know? Is this still Canada?
This is absolutely terrifying, if you stop to think about it. Whether you are Christian or not, you must agree that it is heinous that the main religion of Canadians is being forced into hiding by these Commissions. Is this what was originally intended when our government drew up the Charter? Nowadays, kids go to school and learn about every religion except Christianity. No one is allowed to complain. But if one of these kids attending the workshop goes to school and tells his friends about it, all hell will break loose. It has to be kept a secret. The founding religion of the modern world: Now a dirty little secret for backrooms and speakeasies.
“This is absolutely terrifying, if you stop to think about it.”
Unless, of course, you read the document in context.
What you are citing is an ideologue, providing an edited, narrative account on an ideological website. It is not a transcript. It includes no commentary, response or rebuttal from the HRC person, who seems simply to have been responding sympathetically, and helpfully, to a fairly leading question: how do I make sure I’m ABSOLUTELY covered?
It’s great anti-HRC propaganda, but only if accept it as completly accurate, and read it with the intent of getting angry. Which is, of course, your goal.
Comment by balbulican — June 29, 2008 @ 7:37 am
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Pingback by Webloggin - Blog Archive » Canadian Human Rights Commission Seeks To Push Christian Teachings Underground — June 29, 2008 @ 8:48 am
Christianity was founded on the principle of free will? Where on earth do you get that idea? What did Jesus ever say that could even remotely be construed as endorsing the free will of the individual?
Christians have always been big fans of people being free to do what they tell them. Maybe that’s where you’re getting confused.
Comment by M@ — June 29, 2008 @ 10:12 am
Christianity was founded on the principle of free will? Well, sure, if by “free will” you mean “teaching young children that an invisible man in the sky will make them burn in agony for all of eternity unless they believe in him”. If that’s your definition of free will, though, then you’ve got some serious issues.
On the other hand, I find the actions of the HRC here to be despicable. If you want to be a bigoted prick, you should have that right without needing everyone around you to sign consent forms. Ignorance should not be a crime.
Comment by Alex — June 29, 2008 @ 10:15 am
Canada may not be the very worst country in the world, but it is definitely the lamest.
Comment by BillyHW — June 29, 2008 @ 10:26 am
Ok Balbulican, where to heck is the original conversation you say is being paraphrased? Why have you not provided a link or posted the actual part that supports your version of the interchange?
One is left to believe you don’t because it doesn’t. We wait breathlessly for your further edification……expecting to die waiting.
Comment by Jim R — June 29, 2008 @ 11:19 am
Pardon us for our inclination to believe the version RightGirl posted, since this seems to fall right in line with what we have come to expect from socialists…..and communists, behavior.
For some odd reason, religion scares the hell out of them. They seem to view Christianity as a direct threat to their idealogy, and as history shows, they’d be right.
Comment by Jim R — June 29, 2008 @ 11:26 am
Jim, you don’t understand my point.
A verbatim transcipt of a conversation is a rendering of precisely what was said, word for word. The version of the conversation quoted in this post is paraphrased. It is not verbatim. It consists of the narrator’s narrative summary and interpretation of what was said. You see the difference?
‘Pardon us for our inclination to believe the version RightGirl posted.”
That inclination surprises me not in the least. The narrator’s version was clearly written to elicit exactly that response, as was Right Girl’s decision to post those excerpts. I am simply pointing out the world of difference between:
- a paraphrased, edited narrative posted by an ideologue on an ideological site, and
- a transcript.
“This seems to fall right in line with what we have come to expect from socialists…..and communists, behavior. For some odd reason, religion scares the hell out of them. ”
Not really. Religion doesn’t scare me, except when it seems to shut down folks’ capacity for rational thought - I think abortion clinic bombers and Islamist suicide terrorists are equally nuts.
Socialist Christians tend to view Christ as a proto-socialist, and I think there’s at least as good an argument to made for that position, based on scripture, as for the position that he was a capitalist.
Comment by balbulican — June 29, 2008 @ 1:25 pm
[...] GIRL ON THE RIGHT– Um, Christianity already has free will: “Stephen Boisson, Alberta Public Enemy #1 and [...]
Pingback by Steynian 183 « Free Mark Steyn! — June 29, 2008 @ 4:23 pm
Amazing these Human Rights Commissions can take on cases that courts would toss out for being against “freedom”. They appear to the modern-day Inquisitions of old Europe.
Comment by Troy — June 30, 2008 @ 10:18 am
[...] The Alberta Human Rights Commission hasn’t quite gotten to that point, and so is not quite on par with e.g. the government of Iran. However, it should be noted that the lengths that the AHRC is demanding that Christians go to in order to distribute materials or host a teaching retreat certainly smacks of the various controls and pressures that the Soviet state exerted on the Russian churches. [...]
Pingback by atheist rap makes Christian rock sound better » Driving Christians underground? (Time Immortal) — June 30, 2008 @ 1:15 pm