The Top Ten Same Sex Marriage False "Facts"

When one judge overturned the will of more then seven million Californians last week in Perry vs. Schwarzenegger, he listed 80 supposed “findings of fact” (FF) as evidence that Proposition 8 violates the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution.  Many of those 80 findings are not facts at all.  They’re lies or distortions.

Before we address the top ten false “facts” asserted by Judge Vaughn Walker, there is one real fact in his opinion that defeats the entire case for his opinion.  Here it is:

“The evidence at trial shows that marriage in the United States traditionally has not been open to same-sex couples.”

Since that fact is unquestionably true, how can Judge Walker honestly declare that Proposition 8 violates the Fourteenth Amendment? Certainly no one in 1868 intended the Fourteenth Amendment to redefine marriage.  Only the most tyrannical form of judicial activism can get Judge Walker to his conclusion.

Second, Prop 8 doesn’t violate the Fourteenth Amendment because every person in America already has equal marriage rights. We’re all playing by the same rules—we all have the same right to marry any non-related adult of the opposite sex. Those rules do not deny anyone “equal protection of the laws” because the qualifications to enter a marriage apply equally to everyone—every adult person has the same right to marry.

What about homosexuals?  That leads us to Judge Walker’s first false “fact.”

1.  “Sexual orientation is fundamental to a person’s identity and is a distinguishing characteristic that defines gays and lesbians as a discrete group.” (FF 44)   This is the most important of the false facts because Walker’s entire case collapses without it.  The “fact” is false because it ignores the difference between desires and behavior.

Having certain sexual desires—whether you were “born” with them or acquired them sometime in life—does not mean that you are being discriminated against if the law doesn’t allow the behavior you desire.  Good laws discriminate against behavior. They do not discriminate against people. If Walker’s false “fact” was a real fact, we’d have to redefine marriage to include not just same sex couples, but also relatives, multiple partners, children or any other sexual relationship people desire.  After all, those are “sexual orientations” too.

In other words, there should be no legal class of “gay” or “straight,” just a legal class called “person.” And it doesn’t matter whether persons desire sex with the same or opposite sex, or whether they desire sex with children, parents, multiple partners or farm animals.  What matters is whether the behavior desired is something the country should prohibit, permit or promote.  And that’s a job for the people, not judges.

2.  “California has no interest in asking gays and lesbians to change their sexual orientation or in reducing the number of gays and lesbians in California.” (FF 47)

Other than helping them avoid disease and live longer, absolutely no reason.  As I document here, health problems are higher and life spans shorter for homosexuals.  This has touched me personally (and perhaps someone you know as well)—a childhood friend of mine died from AIDS at the age of 36.  How is it wise public policy to endorse behavior that leads to such tragic results? That’s exactly what same-sex marriage does—it endorses homosexual behavior, which results in serious health problems and shorter life spans.  Permitting unhealthy behavior is one thing, but endorsing it is quite another.

But won’t same-sex marriage help reduce gay health issues?  Not likely.  See Judge Walker’s next false fact.

3.  “Same-sex couples are identical to opposite-sex couples in the characteristics relevant to the ability to form successful marital unions.” (FF 48)

What does “successful” mean?  It has nothing to do with children according to Judge Walker.  In his “the stork brings children” universe, marriage is merely about coupling; procreation is just incidental to it.  He thinks a “successful” marriage is merely about commitment, but he can’t even support that case.

In another instance of special pleading, Judge Walker ignores the evidence that at least half of committed homosexual relationships are open as even the New York Times reported.  (Other studies found even higher rates of promiscuity and infidelity.) This is so well known it’s a travesty that Judge Walker claims exactly the opposite is true. The Times reported, “None of this is news in the gay community, but few will speak publicly about it. Of the dozen people in open relationships contacted for this column, no one would agree to use his or her full name, citing privacy concerns. They also worried that discussing the subject could undermine the legal fight for same-sex marriage.”  Maybe Judge Walker was worried too, and that’s why he didn’t bother mentioning this real fact with his false facts.

4.  “Permitting same-sex couples to marry will not affect the number of opposite-sex couples who marry, divorce, cohabit, have children outside of marriage or otherwise affect the stability of opposite-sex marriages.”  (FF 55)

Judge Walker cites just four years of data from Massachusetts to make that sweeping conclusion about the most important relationship in human civilization.  The truth is that evidence from other countries over a much longer period shows a mutually reinforcing relationship between same-sex marriage and illegitimacy.  And the disastrous results of 40 years of liberalized divorce laws show how monumentally important marriage laws are to the health of marriages, children, and the nation.

5. “Proposition 8 does not affect the First Amendment rights of those opposed to marriage for same-sex couples.” (FF 62)

It’s too bad Judge Walker didn’t look to evidence from Massachusetts for this false fact. If he had he would have seen that court-imposed same-sex marriage has severely affected First Amendment rights.  Same sex marriage may not affect heterosexual marriage behavior quickly, but it certainly affects the free exercise of religion very quickly.

Parents in Massachusetts now have no right to know when their children are being taught homosexuality in grades as low as Kindergarten, neither can they opt their kids out (one parent was even jailed overnight for protesting this).  Businesses are now forced to give benefits to same-sex couples regardless of any moral or religious objection the business owner may have.  The government also ordered Catholic Charities to give children to homosexuals wanting to adopt.  As a result, Catholic Charities closed their adoption agency rather than submit to an immoral order.  Unfortunately, children are again the victims of the morality that comes with same-sex marriage.

“But you can’t legislate morality!” some say.  Nonsense.  Not only do all laws legislate morality, sometimes immorality is imposed by judges against the will of the people and in violation of religious rights.  There is no neutral ground here.  Either we will have freedom of religion and conscience, or we will be forced to adhere to the whims of judges who declare that their own distorted view of morality supersedes our rights—rights that our founders declared self-evident.

Think I’m overreacting?  If this decision survives and nullifies all democratically decided laws in the 45 states that preserve natural marriage, religious rights violations in Massachusetts will go nationwide.  In fact, it’s poised to happen already at the federal level. President Obama recently appointed gay activist Chai Feldblum to the EEOC.  Speaking of the inevitable conflict between religious rights and so-called gay rights, Feldblum said, “I’m having a hard time coming up with any case in which religious liberty should win.”

6.  “No credible evidence supports a finding that an individual may, through conscious decision, therapeutic intervention or any other method, change his or her sexual orientation.” (FF 46)

I guess thousands of ex-gays just don’t exist in Judge Walker’s special-pleading universe.  Neither does renowned Columbia University psychiatrist, Dr. Robert Spitzer, who concluded that some highly motivated individuals can change their orientation from homosexual to heterosexual through reorientation therapy.

This is significant because Spitzer is no propagandist for the religious right. Quite the contrary—a self-described “Jewish atheist,” Spitzer has been a hero to homosexual activists since 1973 when he helped get homosexuality declassified as a mental disorder.  Recently, however, they’ve turned on him because he reported the truth.

Dr. Spitzer said that his 2003 study “has been criticized severely by many people, particularly gay activists, who apparently, feel quite threatened by it. They have the feeling that in order to get their civil rights, it’s helpful to them if they can present the view that once you’re a homosexual you can never change.”

When asked whether the American Psychiatric Association should now change their position statements that say orientation cannot be changed, Dr. Spitzer said, “I think they should, [but] they will not be. . . . There’s a gay activist group that’s very strong and very vocal and is recognized officially by the American Psychiatric Association. There’s nobody to give the other viewpoint. There may be a few who believe it but they won’t talk.”

Dr. Spitzer then acknowledged explicitly that politics often trump the scientific facts at organizations like the APA (an organization cited to bolster Judge Walker’s conclusion).   He also said that the APA should stop applying a double standard by discouraging reorientation therapy, while actively encouraging gay-affirmative therapy that’s intended to confirm and solidify a homosexual identity.  Good point by Dr. Spitzer. After all, if people can be talked into it, then why can’t they be talked out of it?

Sexual orientation isn’t like race either.  You’ll find many former homosexuals, but you’ll never find a former African American.

Of course Walker’s “fact” even if true is irrelevant anyway.  Marriage does not need to be redefined just because people can’t change their sexual desires.  Otherwise a legal “marriage” relationship must be created for every particular sexual desire.

7.  “The gender of a child’s parent is not a factor in a child’s adjustment.” (FF 70)

Incredibly, Judge Walker says that this conclusion “is accepted beyond serious debate.”  Citing a study by the politicized APA, Walker never admits that not enough research has been done to evaluate the well being of children living with homosexual parents.  And he ignored evidence presented by the defense that contradicted his “fact.”

But does one really need a study to know that Walker is wrong?  Was your father different as a parent than your mother?   To say no is laughable.  In fact, even Rodney Dangerfield could expose this false fact.  “No respect at all—when I was a baby, I was breast fed by my father!”

Later in the opinion, Walker makes the unbelievable assertion that, “Gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage; marriage under law is a union of equals.”  Who sez?  The imperial Judge Walker.

Questions for the Judge:  Why do you assert that men and women are interchangeable as parents but not as sex partners?  After all, if gender really is irrelevant to marriage as you maintain—if men and women are interchangeable—then why argue for same-sex marriage at all?  Why not just tell homosexuals, “Gender is irrelevant to marriage, so instead of making a fuss, why not just go ahead and marry someone from the opposite sex”?

Why not?  Because when it comes to their own personal gratification, homosexual activists like Judge Walker clearly recognize the big difference between the sexes.  But when it comes to the more important priority of raising children, they say there is no difference between the sexes.  Children are just going to have to take a backseat to their sexual desires.  Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse sums up the attitude of homosexual activists well. She writes, “[Homosexual] adults are entitled to have what they want. Children have to take what we give them.”

8.  “Religious beliefs that gay and lesbian relationships are sinful or inferior to heterosexual relationships harm gays and lesbians.” (FF 77)

Really? Do religious beliefs that drunkenness is sinful or inferior to sobriety harm alcoholics?  No, those beliefs help such people by telling them the truth about destructive behavior instead of enabling them with liberal fantasyland talk about how all behaviors and lifestyles are equal.

9.  “Proposition 8 results in frequent reminders for gays and lesbians in committed long-term relationships that their relationships are not as highly valued as opposite-sex relationships.” (FF 68)

This is not meant to be offensive, but what if certain relationships really are more valuable to society than others?  Clearly, the procreative committed relationship of a man and a woman is more valuable than any other relationship in society because it is necessary for society’s very survival. To comprehend the impact of this, you just need to consider two questions.

1) What would happen to society if everyone lived faithfully in natural marriage?  Our country would thrive with a drastic reduction in numerous social problems including illegitimacy, crime, welfare, and abortion.

2) What would happen to society if everyone lived faithfully in same-sex marriage?  Society wouldn’t thrive because it wouldn’t even survive.  It would end the human race!

This is not to say that such a law would cause this, but merely to point out that certain relationships are more valuable to a society than others.  The truth is that homosexual and heterosexual relationships are not the same, can never be the same, and will never yield the same benefits to individuals or society.  No law can change that fact; only deceive people into thinking so.

If this point offends you, then you have a problem with reality not me.  I didn’t make up the facts of nature.  I’m just admitting them—something Judge Walker and many same-sex marriage supporters seem unwilling to do.

10.  “Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license.” (Conclusion) 

 The real fact is that Judge Walker fails to provide any “rational basis” for overturning Proposition 8—no rational basis from the constitution or common sense.  While lecturing the people of California that their “private moral views” cannot be used to make their laws, Judge Walker has simply imposed his own “private moral view” that same-sex marriage must be sanctioned.  That is objectively immoral and unconstitutional itself.

He claims that the exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage “exists as an artifact of a time when the genders were seen as having distinct roles in society and in marriage. That time has passed.”  If that’s true, that’s not for him or any judge to decide. The people of California have said that time has not passed.

Disagree?  Then you have the burden of persuading your fellow citizens to pass a constitutional amendment sanctioning same-sex marriage. That’s what the amendment process is for!  When judges short-circuit that process, we are no longer a free people who govern ourselves.

(For more about this complicated and sensitive issue, get my compact book from which some of this article is adapted: Correct, Not Politically Correct:  How Same-Sex Marriage Hurts Everyone.)

Note: This column originally appeared in two parts at www.Townhall.com.

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Gay Totalitarianism vs. Christian Liberty

Two Christian graduate students at public universities (Eastern Michigan University and Augusta State University)  are being expelled from their counseling programs for their religious and moral objections to homosexual behavior.   One case has been decided in favor of EMU (and will be appealed) and the other case has just been filed.   The Alliance Defense Fund is representing both students.

Why the expulsions?  Because the American Counseling Association’s (ACA) “code of ethics” prevents counselors from “imposing values that are inconsistent with counseling goals.”  That, of course, is a value imposed on the counselor, and it begs the question as to what are the “counseling goals.”  What if the client wants to stop engaging in homosexual behavior?  I guess the ACA can’t tolerate that.

The people who say they are fighting for tolerance and diversity are the most intolerant and least diverse people out there.  According to them, the only people who can be counselors are those that affirm homosexuality.   So much for tolerance and diversity.  Instead, they advocate a form of totalitarianism by shutting out different viewpoints and insisting that everyone must agree with them on such a controversial issue.   That includes all people– religious or not– who disagree with homosexual behavior.

The student at EMU, Ms. Julea Ward, didn’t even want to counsel that homosexual behavior was wrong.  She just pledged that she would refer clients with homosexual issues to other counselors.  That wasn’t good enough for EMU.  They wanted to put Ms. Ward through a “remediation” program so she could “see the error of her ways.”  Jennifer Keeton at Augusta State must attend Gay “Pride” parades and change her mind to say in the program.  Speaking of totalitarianism, these  requirements remind me of the goals of a Soviet style “re-education” camp.

These cases have obvious implications on religious rights, and illustrate that there is no such thing as value neutrality.  The value put forth by the ACA, Eastern Michigan University, and Augusta State University is that people with different values need not apply. Either we’ll have gay totalitarianism or Christian liberty, but we won’t have both.

I said quite a bit about this on today’s radio program which should be up in podcast in a couple of days.  I just don’t have time to write more today.   To get a good perspective on the cases and problems with the ACA code of ethics, see Kelly Boggs column here.

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Obama Administration OKs First Tax-Funded Abortions Under Health Care Law

As predicted by all reasonable people who knew that Obama’s executive order was disingenuous, elective abortion will now be paid for with your tax dollars.  The Obama administration has just approved it.  This is truly a “moral injustice of the first order.”  Here are the details.

By the way, I don’t merely object to abortion because I’m now paying for it.  Abortion is wrong no matter who pays for it.  Tax-payer funding just adds another injustice.

UPDATE 7/19/2010:  Perhaps due to pressure and the spotlight put on this issue, the Obama administration reversed itself. Click here for details.  However, pro-lifers are calling for a law to be passed to prevent abortion funding because an executive order cannot overrule the health care law.   A new congress seems the only hope for that.

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Judicial Activism vs. Liberty

(This column first appeared on Townhall.com)

Elena Kagan called the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy “a moral injustice of the first order.” A moral injustice of the first order?  Where on her moral hierarchy is a real “first order” injustice like murder?  Not high enough.  For Elena Kagan, sexual standards that protect military readiness are a moral injustice, but tearing apart a baby in the womb is a moral right.

 

I have little doubt that given the opportunity, Ms. Kagan would impose this kind of inverted moral reasoning in her judicial opinions.  She already advocated as much when she clerked for Justice Marshall, and when she distorted information about partial birth abortion as a policy advisor to President Clinton.  She wants to correct what she sees as injustices from the bench.

That should scare everyone.  By whose standard is she declaring something injust?

Whenever someone talks about injustice, they are implying that there is such a thing as justice.  You can’t know what is not just unless you know what is just.  True justice, however, requires grounding in something other than human opinion.   Otherwise, we are left with the problem of, “Who sez?”

According to our Declaration of Independence, that grounding is our Creator. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Our founders called this “Nature’s Law” or “Natural Law”—the same Natural Law that Vice President Joe “Ted Knight” Biden pooh-poohed when he was the Senator from Delaware during Clarence Thomas’s confirmation hearings.  (My money is on the intellectual firepower of our founders, not Ted Knight.)

If there is no God, then everything is just a matter of opinion—kicking out of the military people who commit homosexual acts is no better or worse than keeping them in.  In fact, if there is no God, Mother Teresa was not morally better than Hitler in any objective sense. In order for Mother Teresa’s behavior to be “better” than Hitler’s, there has to be an objective standard of “best” beyond both of them by which we can measure both of them.

C.S. Lewis put it this way, “The moment you say that one set of moral ideas can be better than another, you are, in fact, measuring them both by a standard, saying that one of them conforms to that standard more nearly than the other. But the standard that measures two things is something different from either. You are, in fact, comparing them both with some Real Morality, admitting that there is such a thing as a real Right, independent of what people think, and that some people’s ideas get nearer to that real Right than others. Or put it this way. If your moral ideas can be truer, and those of the Nazis less true, there must be something—some Real Morality—for them to be true about.”

My question for Ms. Kagan is this:  What’s your standard?  By what standard is “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” “a moral injustice of the first order” and abortion a moral right?

Does she appeal to the Constitution?  Certainly the Constitution says nothing about homosexuality or abortion (despite what activist courts have said). But the Constitution does assign the authority to Congress (not the courts) to establish rules for a well-functioning military.  That’s why Kagan’s cries of unjust discrimination by the military are false.  She needs to understand that military service is not a right. As I’ve argued before, for the sake of national security, the military rightfully discriminates against numerous behaviors and conditions. Recruits can only qualify if they meet rigorous physical and mental standards and agree to give up certain behaviors (that’s why it’s called “service”).  This has always been true about the world’s greatest military beginning with George Washington’s army.  Since joining the military is not a constitutional right, along with these other reasons, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is certainly constitutional.

Does Ms. Kagan appeal to God and Natural Law for her standard?  I doubt she would go there.  If so, she would have to make the untenable case that God believes homosexual behavior and abortion are moral rights. That’s anything but self-evident, as evidenced by the texts of all major religions, the “laws of nature,” and the design of the human body.  Our founders called homosexuality a “crime against nature” for a reason.

If Natural Law and the Constitution are not standards of justice for Ms. Kagan, what is?  She’s left with nothing but her own personal moral standard.  “Who sez?” is not Natural Law or the Constitution, but Elena Kagan.  And that’s exactly the problem with activist judges.  They ignore the laws of nature and the laws of the land to legislate their own laws based on their own personal standard of morality—and in the case of liberal activists, it’s usually a very bizarre, morally inverted standard.

“But you can’t legislate morality!”  Nonsense. All laws legislate morality.  Each law declares one behavior right and its opposite wrong.  The only question is, “Whose morality will be legislated?” Unfortunately, activist judges often ignore our common “self-evident” morality in order to legislate their own immorality on the rest of the nation.

That must stop if freedom is to survive.  All freedom-loving Americans should oppose judicial activists.  Even if you agree with Ms. Kagan on certain issues, you should want the people to retain the power to govern themselves.  Otherwise, when she disagrees with you, you will have little practical recourse.  So, if you want legal abortion or gays in the military, then persuade your fellow citizens and legislators to vote for such measures.  Pass a constitutional amendment like we did with slavery and women’s suffrage. That’s what the amendment process is for!

But don’t give up your liberty and the ability to govern yourself by allowing unelected, lifetime-appointed, judges to impose their view of what’s good for America on you and the rest of the country.  That’s judicial tyranny, plain and simple, and that’s exactly what we’re asking for when we put judicial activists on the Supreme Court.

“Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” is not “a moral injustice of the first order.”  Giving up liberty won by the sacrifice of millions is.


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Liberals Flunk Econ 101

John Zogby recently interviewed nearly 5,000 American adults and asked them eight basic questions about economics.  The eight questions have easily provable answers.

Here are the bottom line results published in a Wall Street Journal article titled “Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader:”  the more conservative people did the best and the more liberal people did the worst.   In fact, as a group, the moderates to very liberal all failed.  Out of eight questions, here is the average score of each group:

Very Conservative (1.3 wrong)=84% correct

Libertarian (1.38)= 83%

Conservative (1.67)=79%

Moderate (3.67)= 54%

Liberal (4.69)= 41%

Very Liberal (5.26)=34%

Here are the results by party affiliation:

Republicans (1.61)= 80%

Democrats (4.59)=43%

Going to college was no indicator of intelligence in this survey.  On half the questions folks without a college education scored better than those that had one. In fact, in their abstract, the authors of the article wrote, “for people inclined to take such a survey, basic economic enlightenment is not correlated with going to college.”

Why then these results?  Could it be that liberals and conservatives have two radically different views of human nature that influence them to answer in the way they do?   Conservatives tend to understand that human nature is fallen and thus, when it comes to economics, needs incentives.  Liberals tend to think against all the evidence that humans are inherently good and will do the right thing without incentives (even in the face of disincentives).

My friend Neil Mammen, who has an excellent new book, puts it this way on page 255:  “Socialism depends on every man working as much as he can and only taking up as little has he needs.  Yet in reality human nature is such that we work as little as we need and take as much as we can.  Anybody who advocates socialism is essentially helping man continue to be mired in his sin nature.”

I used to think that many liberals were denying the facts.  Now this survey makes me think that they just don’t know them. Maybe that’s because their false worldview causes them to never question what they already think is true.  Sometimes it’s not the things we don’t know that cause us trouble– it’s the things we think are true but really aren’t.

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Is God Good? (A Short Film)

Here is animated short film called, “Is God Good?”  In less than two minutes, it succinctly addresses how human freedom relates to the problem of evil (with some brilliant animated imagery).

This 2-minute video is a kind of animation known as kinetic type. This genre allows the artist to get a little crazy – words become designs, not merely carriers of information. My goal in producing this animation was to have fun – which I did – and to creatively express this idea: the presence of evil in our world does NOT mean that there is no God; rather, it means that he’s up to something. This is a short video so it only scratches the surface – but at least it introduces the concepts and, hopefully, encourages further thought on the subject.

Whenever I think about deep stuff like evil and suffering, I find it helpful to remember two aspects of God’s nature. First, he is perfectly just. So all evil will eventually be punished perfectly and appropriately. Second, he is perfectly loving. Thus, God extends himself sacrificially to forgive those who do evil (all of us) and provide an escape from punishment. What’s amazing to me is how both of these sides of God, his justice and love, collide on the cross with Jesus Christ. You know someone truly loves you if they are willing to die for you. But when God forgave us, he did not simply ignore our evil thoughts, choices, and actions. That wouldn’t be justice, would it? All of our crimes, big and small, were punished perfectly, but the punishment was re-directed toward Jesus Christ. The punishment that Jesus took upon himself demonstrate God’s love and God’s justice.

This video also touches on another cool idea: God is a gentleman. That is, he doesn’t force his love on the objects of his affection (all of us). He is persuasive – not coercive. He allows you to turn your back on him if you prefer to be the captain of your own ship. You may not want to acknowledge a higher authority to whom you must answer. You may not want to admit that you don’t have your act together. He allows you to make that choice. On the other hand, you might realize that God’s relentless love is what you’ve been searching for all of your life. It’s like this: a gentleman does not force a woman to marry him. He becomes vulnerable. He expresses his love to her by his words and actions. Then he asks her to make a decision: “Will you marry me?” At this point, the ball is in her court. She can either accept or reject his offer. In the same way, each of us can accept or reject God’s offer of a life-giving connection through Jesus Christ.

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Dennis Prager on American Exceptionalism

With wit, passion and clarity, radio talk show host Dennis Prager unearths one of the root problems in America today– the failure of our schools and parents to teach why America is exceptional.  American exceptionalism is not elitism but the admission that certain moral values are better than others.

Note: those who say that certain moral values are not better than others are making a value judgment, thus defeating their own case. In other words, saying that we should prefer “multiculturalism” (whatever that means) to the moral values legislated in our Constitution (yes, all laws legislate morality), is itself a value judgment. On what moral grounds does one make the case that multiculturalism is better than the Bill of Rights?

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The Bible: Embarrassing and True (Part 2)

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Do the New Testament documents tell the truth about what really happened in the first century?  As I wrote in my last column, authors claiming to write history are unlikely to invent embarrassing details about themselves or their heroes.  Since the New Testament documents are filled with embarrassing details, we can be reasonably certain that they are telling the truth.

Notice that the disciples frequently depict themselves as dim wits.  They fail to understand what Jesus is saying several times, and don’t understand what his mission is about until after the resurrection.  Their thick-headedness even earns their leader, Peter, the sternest rebuke from Jesus:  “Get behind me Satan!” (What great press the disciples provided for their leader and first Pope! Contrary to popular opinion, it seems the church really didn’t have editorial control of the scriptures after all.)

After Jesus asks them to stay up and pray with him during his greatest hour of need, the disciples fall asleep on Jesus not once, but twice!  Then, after pledging to be faithful to the end, Peter denies Christ three times, and all but one of them run away.

The scared, scattered, skeptical disciples make no effort to give Jesus a proper burial.  Instead they say a member of the Jewish ruling body that sentenced Jesus to die is the noble one—Joseph of Arimathea buries Jesus in a Jewish tomb (which would have been easy for the Jews to refute if it wasn’t true).  Two days later, while the men are still hiding, the women go down and discover the empty tomb and the risen Jesus.

Who wrote all that down?  Men—some of the men who were characters in the story.  Now if you were part of a group of men trying to pass off a false resurrection story as the truth, would you depict yourselves as dim-witted, bumbling, rebuked, lazy, skeptical sissies, who ran away at the first sign of trouble, while the women were the brave ones who discovered the empty tomb and the risen Jesus?

If men were inventing the resurrection story, it would go more like this:

Jesus came to save the world, and he needed our help.  That’s why we were there for him every step of the way.  When he was in need, we prayed with him.  When he wept, we wept with him (and told him to toughen up!).  When he fell, we carried his cross.  The gates of Hell could not prevent us from seeing his mission through!

So when that turncoat Judas brought the Romans by (we always suspected Judas), and they began to nail Jesus to the cross, we laughed at them.  “He’s God you idiots!  The grave will never keep him! You think you’re solving a problem, but you’re really creating a much bigger one!”

While we assured the women that everything would turn out all right, they couldn’t handle the crucifixion.  Squeamish and afraid, they ran to their homes screaming and hid behind locked doors.

But we men stood steadfast at the foot of the cross, praying for hours until the very end. When Jesus finally took his last breath and the Roman Centurion confessed that Jesus was God, Peter blasted him, “That’s what we told you before you nailed him up there!” (Through this whole thing, the Romans and the Jews just wouldn’t listen!)

Never doubting that Jesus would rise on the third day, Peter announced to the Centurion, “We’ll bury him and be back on Sunday. Now go tell Pilate to put some of your ‘elite’ Roman guards at the tomb to see if you can prevent him from rising from the dead!”  We all laughed and began to dream about Sunday.

That Sunday morning we marched right down to the tomb and tossed those elite Roman guards aside.  Then the stone (that took eleven us to roll into place) rolled away by itself.  A glowing Jesus emerged from tomb, and said, “I knew you’d come! My mission is accomplished.” He praised Peter for his brave leadership and congratulated us on our great faith.  Then we went home and comforted the trembling women.

There are other events in the New Testament documents concerning Jesus that are also unlikely to be made up.  For example, Jesus:

  • Is considered “out of his mind” by his own family who come to seize him to take him home (Mk 3:21,31).
  • Is deserted by many of his followers after he says that followers must eat his flesh and drink his blood. (John 6:66).
  • Is not believed by his own brothers (John 7:5).  (Disbelief turned to belief after the resurrection—ancient historians tell us that Jesus’ brother James died a martyr as the leader of the church in Jerusalem in A.D. 62).
  • Is thought to be a deceiver (John 7:12).
  • Turns off Jewish believers to the point that they want to stone him (John 8:30-59).
  • Is called a “madman” (John 10:20).
  • Is called a “drunkard” (Mt. 11:19).
  • Is called “demon-possessed” (Mk 3:22, Jn 7:20, 8:48).
  • Has his feet wiped with hair of a prostitute which easily could have been seen as a sexual advance (Lk 7:36-39).
  • ·Is crucified despite the fact that “anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse” (Deut 21:23).

If you’re inventing a Messiah to the Jews, you don’t say such things about him.  You also don’t admit that some of you “still doubted” Jesus had really risen from the dead, especially while he’s standing right in front of you giving the great commission (Mt. 28:17-19).

Finally, anyone trying to pass off a false resurrection story as the truth would never say the women were the first witnesses at the tomb.  In the first century, a woman’s testimony was not considered on par with that of a man.  An invented story would say that the men—the brave men—had discovered the empty tomb.  Yet all four gospels say the women were the first witnesses – all this while the sissy-pants men had their doors locked for fear of the Jews.  (After I made this point during a presentation, a lady told me that she knew why Jesus appeared to the women first.  “Why?” I asked.  She said, “Because he wanted to get the story out!”)

In light of these embarrassing details—along with the fact that the New Testament documents contain early, eyewitness testimony for which the writers gave their lives—it takes more faith to believe that the New Testament writers were not telling the truth.

(This column was originally published at www.Townhall.com)

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The Bible: Embarrassing and True (Part 1)

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What are your most embarrassing moments?  You don’t want to admit them. And if you do admit them, you certainly won’t add to your shame by inventing embarrassing moments about yourself to make you look even worse.  Who’s going to lie to make himself look bad?  People will lie to make themselves look good (especially politicians), but no one will lie to make himself look bad.

That’s why when historical accounts contain events embarrassing to the authors (or heroes of the authors) those events are probably true.  Historians call this the principle of embarrassment, and it’s one reason why I think the writers of the Bible are telling the truth.  There are far too many embarrassing details about the supposed heroes of the faith to be invented.

Just take a look at the Old Testament storyline.  There’s little chance the Jews would have invented it.  A story invented by Hebrews would more likely depict the Israelites as a noble and upright people. But the Old Testament writers don’t say this.  Instead they depict their own people as sinful and fickle slaves who, time after time, are miraculously rescued by God, but who abandon him every chance they get.  For example, after witnessing miracle after miracle that frees them from slavery in Egypt, they can’t resist worshiping the Golden Calf when Moses spends a few extra nights on the mountain.  Talk about ungrateful folks with short memories!  (We seem to suffer from this in America too).

The Old Testament writers record a Hebrew history filled with bone-headed disobedience, distrust, and selfishness. Their leaders are all world-class sinners, including Moses (a murderer), Saul (a paranoid egomaniac), David (an adulterer, liar, and murderer), and Solomon (a serial polygamist). These are supposed to be the “chosen people”—the ones through which God brings the Savior of the world?  Yes, and the Old Testament writers admit that the ancestors of this Messiah include deeply sinful characters such as David and Solomon and even a non-Hebrew prostitute named Rahab. This is clearly not an invented storyline!

While the Old Testament tells of one embarrassing gaffe after another, most other ancient historians avoid even mentioning unflattering historical events. For example, there’s been nothing found in the records of Egypt about the Exodus, leading some critics to suggest the event never occurred. But what do the critics expect? Peter Fineman imagines what a press release from Pharaoh might say:

“A spokesman for Rameses the great, Pharaoh of Pharaohs, supreme ruler of Egypt, son of Ra, before whom all tremble in awe blinded by his brilliance, today announced that the man Moses had kicked his royal butt for all the world to see, thus proving that God is Yahweh and the 2,000-year-old-culture of Egypt is a lie. Film at 11:00.”

Of course no press secretary for Pharaoh would admit such an event if he wanted to keep his head!  The Egyptian silence on the Exodus is understandable.

By contrast, when the Egyptians scored a military victory, they went to press and exaggerated greatly. This is apparent from the oldest known reference to Israel outside the Bible. It comes from a granite monument found in the funerary temple of Pharaoh Merneptah in Thebes. The monument boasts about the military victory of the Pharaoh in the highlands of Canaan, claiming that “Israel is laid waste, his seed is not.” Historians date the battle to 1207 B.C., which confirms that Israel was in the land by that time.  We know this account is exaggerated because, as history attests, Israel was not laid waste. Its seed lived on and sprouted into a great empire under David 200 years later.  And its seed lives on to this day more than 3,200 years later.

How does the New Testament measure up to the principle of embarrassment?  While embarrassing testimony is alone not enough to ensure historical reliability—early, eyewitness testimony is also necessary (which the New Testament has)—the principle of embarrassment is even more pronounced in the New Testament.  The people who wrote down much of the New Testament are characters (or friends of characters) in the story, and they often depict themselves an extremely unflattering light.  Their claims are not likely to be invented.

Let’s put it this way: If you and your manly friends were concocting a story that you wanted to pass off as the truth, would you make yourselves look like dim-witted, uncaring, rebuked, doubting cowards who ran away at the first sign of trouble while the women were the brave ones who remained faithful? No way! But that’s exactly what we find in the New Testament.  That’s one reason why I don’t have enough faith to believe that the New Testament tells an invented story.

I’ll highlight some of the New Testament’s more embarrassing details in the next column—even a few details that some could interpret as embarrassing to Jesus.  In the meantime, you can find a cumulative case for God and Christianity in the book from which this column is adapted: I Don’t Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist.

(This column originally appeared at Townhall.com)

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God and Birth Defects

As recorded in John Chapter 9, Jesus saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.”

Australian Nick Vujicic– born without arms and legs– is a living example of that passage. We say the man has a birth defect. But after viewing this, I think I have a far more serious attitude defect.

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