A Battle for Your Values

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by Pastor Luciano Cozzi

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A Battle for Your Values

Could someone in uniform one day may break into your house and arrest you at gunpoint because you have been hiding a copy of the Bible or were caught praying to God? For many this is not as unlikely as we may think.

We know that this is already a tragic reality in other countries. It is so in China, for example, where as recently as November 9, according to Voice of the Martyrs News, Christian converts were arrested and questioned by the Public Security Bureau. We know that in some countries like these Christian activists risk years of “reeducation” for their faith. We grieve at such news, but are not too surprised to hear that similar things happen in Islamic countries like Egypt, where 22 Christians were recently arrested, beaten, interrogated and tortured, according to Charisma News Service.

Not many, however, realize that a much more subtle, but just as dangerous battle against the Judeo-Christian faith is being waged in our own country. This battle is fought almost daily in courtrooms across the nation under the mask of “tolerance.” It is fueled by activists and tolerated by an indifferent majority. It is a war that takes the form of ever increasing limitations to the free expression of the Christian faith. We see it being fought in Denver, for example, where a mother is practically prohibited from practicing her religion in her daughter’s presence, and is forced to teach and model values that are contrary to her beliefs. It strikes elsewhere through the imposition on Catholic hospitals and Catholic employers to provide abortions against their own conscience and the teachings of their faith. It strikes again when, according to Mark Chopko, general counsel for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, this imposition is paralleled by the threatening of church institutions with the loss of their tax-exempt status if they refuse to violate their own teachings and faith on such issues. It strikes in Pompano Beach, Florida, where because of the complaint of one person, in mid-October city officials prohibited all pastors to offer prayers at public meetings using the name of Jesus. It strikes in Massachusetts, where on November 18 the Supreme Judicial Court ruled in a 4-3 decision that same-sex marriages must be considered legal and has ordered the state legislature to respond accordingly within 180 days. In so doing, not only do they openly violate the separation of judicial and legislative powers mandated in their state constitution, but they clearly assault Christian ideals and insult the traditional values held by the majority of Americans.

Meanwhile, in the name of freedom of speech and artistic license, repeated warnings presented to the Senate and published in the most reputable psychological journals since the mid ‘70s continue to be ignored. According to critic Dr. Ted Baehr, by age 17 the average child has spent anywhere between 40,000 and 63,000 hours watching television, movies and playing video games. In that time, they will have witnessed an average of 50,000 murders (depicted ever more graphically by modern special effects), and more than one million sex acts! Compare this with the fact that by the same age the average Christian child will have spent only 11,000 hours in church. It should not be surprising that the American Medical Association earlier this year has echoed the voices of behaviorists, psychologists and sociologists who for the last 30 years have pointed out that violence in the mass media has lead to a progressive increase of violent behavior in teens and young adults.

On a daily basis, Judeo-Christian values are portrayed as unfair, intolerant, prejudiced, and are discouraged or opposed by schools, court houses and the media. Meanwhile, the graphic and extremely realistic portrayal of vulgarity, vices, drug addiction, perverted sex, violence and murder are not only promoted and protected despite the repeated warnings of experts in the behavioral sciences, but are brought into our own homes every day as “entertainment.”

These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. (Deuteronomy 6:6-9 NASB)

Do not bring a detestable thing into your house or you, like it, will be set apart for destruction. Utterly abhor and detest it, for it is set apart for destruction. (Deuteronomy 7:26 NIV)

This should really make us think! In fact, it should make us think twice about remaining complacent and indifferent and should cause us to blow the dust off our Bibles and stand up for our faith. This battle against morality is being waged right now. It is a battle we cannot afford to just watch from our couches just like another form of “entertainment.” In some cases it is a fierce battle, but it cannot be lost. The battleground is in the court houses of our country and in Congress, but most importantly, it is in our own living rooms. It is in the “entertainment” that we bring into our own homes that keeps trying to change our values and to destroy our faith. This is a battle for the mind of our children and for the spirit of our families and country. The time has come for the “silent majority” to wake up and take a stance for what is right. It is time for all of us to make our voices heard and tell our representatives that we will not let our values be so easily overturned.