“the utterance of a theocratic dictator, than of a duly elected civil servant.”
Philippians 4:13. A very simple verse but one that has very deep meaning for Christians. It is an acknowledgement that there is Someone bigger than self, a higher power. It is a telling about that we are not as strong as we might believe but that Faith can transcend even the worst of conditions. It is also an acknowledgement that of a position of servanthood. It speaks, not to a given religion or sect, but to a relationship.
http://twitter.com/#!/GovWalker/status/445244966495727616
A profession of faith; used to be common, very common. Not a big deal at all. No longer.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation has multiple bees in their bonnets – they seem to hate anyone who has a religious expression in their body or outlook. They strut around in a bubble that must not be pierced by any hint of a religious expression; they believe they can demand that everyone else accede to THEIR pseudo-made up right “not to be offended by religious displays in the public square”. Any and all mentions of God must not only be removed from their sight but be prevented from ever being seen or heard.
They are turning the First Amendment on its head and have no problem in being the Bullies that have no compunction in using the threat of a law suit (e.g., Lawfare) to silence those that hold opposite positions. Angry people, they are. Self-important, too. And now for a simple exercise of his religious faith, they are targeting him.
They are an intolerant and extremist, hardly numbering more than a spit in the bucket, people who believe they should control everyone else’s First Amendment Rights (emphasis mine):
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is on the receiving end of a letter of complaint from the Freedom From Religion Foundation in Madison for a religious tweet on his official Facebook and Twitter accounts.
On Sunday, March 16, either Walker or someone empowered to posted the following: “Philippians 4:13” (see screen shots), a bible verse which says, “I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.”
FFRF, a state-church watchdog with 20,000 members nationwide and about 1,300 in Wisconsin, reminded Walker in a March 18 letter that it’s “improper for a state employee, much less for the chief executive officer of the state, to use the machinery of the state of Wisconsin to promote personal religious views.”
Co-Presidents Annie Laurie Gaylor and Dan Barker, in FFRF’s letter, said Walker’s tweet “seems more like a threat, or the utterance of a theocratic dictator, than of a duly elected civil servant.”
When I first became an elected official, along with my friend, we had GraniteGrok and GilfordGrok, a radio show, a newspaper columns, and lots of Letters to the Editor in several papers. And we talked about the politics on the Budget Committee, the goings on in town, and the like. It was not well received at all – we had no problem in airing out dirty laundry, naming names, and letting the folks know where we stood.
Certainly, the “good old boys” who had never experienced two bloggers who operated at the speed of the blogosphere, were not happy campers and they tried a number of schemes to, as the FFRF Bullies are trying to do, to shut us up. They called us all kinds of names, spread all kind of rumors on how we behaved during meetings (taping the meetings stopped that in a hurry) – we just were quicker, knew the laws better, and refused to bow down to pressure.
But the one thing we continued to hold to throughout that time was this:
I did not check in my First Amendment Rights when I got elected.
I refuse to check in my First Amendment Rights at the door just because this is a government meeting.
The First Amendment states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
FFRF are just professional grievance-mongers – it seems that mere waft of someone’s religious incense would send them into a tizzy simply because someone wishes to exercise and express their religious views publicly. Instead, their sense of secular humanism worship (for humanism has its own rituals, indeed, where the chief theological tenet among this sect is “religious nullity”) requires that no one be allowed to be “apostate” from their religious outlook.
FFRF are demanding that an elected official put away his own religious views into a deep dark closet – and by doing so, they earn some measure of “penance” for whatever sins they have committed. Or, perhaps, they believe as Obama does in that they can win “their salvation” only if the Collective earns it with them. Certainly, they are trying to Collectivized a sense of “non-religion religion” amongst the rest of us.
Only those with a hair-trigger sense of outrage could ever see a tweet of a Bible verse as an attempt to establish a State religion (which the Framers did not want to emulate the State sponsored religions of the Old World). Instead, these self-righteous chest-thumpers wish to deny others their Natural Rights that precede the Bill of Rights which only enumerates them.
A real Tyranny of the Minority. Certainly of a mind with Obama and the other Progressives that are trying to shame the religious into silence. Obama has made it clear, even as he relies on his 20 years of sitting in a pew not listening to Rev Jeremiah “G-D America” Write, he believes only in that we have the “Freedom to Worship” and that our first Amendment Rights need to be checked and left at the door of our houses of worship.
After all, Secular Humanism, at the end of the day, stays in its church: Big Government in whom they trust.
