[Vision2020] Change of Perspective, Limited Apology

[Dougs Hero]

Kerry Becker,

You are my hero.

Sincerely,

Dougs' Hero



--- Kerry Becker <col.kerry.becker.ret at gmail.com>
wrote:

Faithful Readers,

I am now about to do something that is hard for
anyone, but especially hard for an old soldier like
myself. I admit that I have been wrong in some of the
opinions that I have previously expressed on this
forum.

Over the past several weeks I have been on an extended
vacation during which I have visited many fellow
officers with whom I have served during my career of
thirty plus years in the military. Those with whom I
visited are all, like myself, conservatives, and think
of ourselves as libertarians. The defense of the
freedoms guaranteed by our unequaled U.S. Constitution
was a main reason for many of us to chose careers in
the military.

Make no mistake. Do not be tempted to make any
misinterpretation. In what I am about to say I having
no intention of lessening my belief in freedom of
speech, religion, press, etc. These freedoms make our
great country truly unique. One need only look at the
countries of our enemies to see how different they are
from us in this regard.

Freedom of speech and the press are our main means to
seek the truth in the complex world we live in. Anyone
who expresses a belief of any kind does not enjoy any
immunity from comment on the truthfulness or inanity
of such expression. To allow immunity in any way would
be to emasculate the pursuit of truth.

To make my point tersely. I have previously been a
staunch supporter on this forum of Christ Church and
its various personages and their actions. While I
still strongly support their right to their beliefs
and to the expression of their beliefs, I no longer am
able support those beliefs themselves or the actions
which are begot by such beliefs.

I have previously believed that Christ Church was a
Godly institution which was trying to honestly bring
goodness and Godliness into the world. I do not
believe this anymore.

I confess to two things that helped bring about this
change of perspective.

First, every fellow retired officer with whom I
visited on my vacation believed as libertarians in the
separation of church and state. The history of the
world as we know it tells us of the disastrous
inhumanity, cruelty, intolerance, suppression of
personal liberty, and injustice that occurs when one
or another set of religious beliefs are advocated and
enforced by a government. But we need not depend on
history for this lesson: newsreaders today can see the
horrible results on personal liberty by the religious
tyranny enforced by many mid-eastern and eastern
nations regardless of the name or nature of their
particular religion.

My officer friends put it this way. “There greatest
threat to personal liberty today are those organized
religious movements who seek to impose their
particular strictures on our freedom of thought,
expression, and actions via political and governmental
intervention in our lives.” Those kind of actions by
the government in England were the motivation for the
founding of our country. Let us not forget that, ever.

This is hard for me to say. I have been wrong about
homosexual practices and homosexual marriages or civil
unions. While I personally find homosexual relations
distasteful to contemplate, I see now the the choice
of partners and pleasures is a matter of personal
liberty guaranteed by the right to “life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness” as stated in our
Declaration of Independence. I see now that I have no
more right to dictate another’s gender preference
and the concomitant unions that might follow than I
have to dictate what nail polish color someone might
chose, whether such choice of color offends me or not.

Second, my officer friends, who know naught of Christ
Church, urged me to re-evaluate the statements of
those opposed -- to try to find out for myself if
those running Christ Church are honest and
well-intentioned, and to see if they seek to impose
strictures based on their particular religious
interpretations on the rest of us that would lessen
our personal liberty.

I have done so.

I have found the statements of Christ Church as found
in various of their writings show them to be dangerous
theocrats who, among other greatly limiting things,
seek to impose eventually the most harsh measures on
all of us who do not share their beliefs.

Especially disturbing to a libertarian is their
intention to impose the death penalty on those they
consider heretical -- anyone who would criticize their
particular religious tenets. This is America. Not
Saudi Arabia or Iran. The denial of the right to
question any belief is the most dangerous and
arbitrary stricture a government can impose on its
citizens. It is the denial to continue to seek the
truth, wherever it might lead.

(God, this old soldier hates to say this since he has
been so critical of some of Christ Christ’s critics,
and hates to admit that he has been hoodwinked due
largely to his own ignorance and lack of diligence. .
..) I have found that Christ Christ is neither a Godly
nor a benevolent institution. Their leader and many of
their upper echelon are now in my informed opinion,
liars, hypocrites, manipulators, blood-suckers from
their congregation, and exceedingly unchristian,
intentionally veering quite far from the basic, plain
moral teachings of Christ found in the most
historically accurate parts of the New Testament.

To the extent that my previous posts have defended
Christ Church’s right to hold and to defend their
beliefs, I offer no apology. They, and all of us have
that right. It is called freedom.

To the extent that any of my previous posts have
defended any particular tenet or theological
aberration of Christ Church, or any of the many
despicable actions that such have begotten, I humbly
apologize for my previous ignorance, lack of critical
thought and investigation, and for my unjustifiably
overbearing attitude.

Kerry Becker


       
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