Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site pyuxd.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!pyuxww!pyuxd!rlr
From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Dr. Emmanuel Wu)
Newsgroups: net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Arguments from Silence: Golden or just Yellow?
Message-ID: <814@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 29-Mar-85 21:00:32 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.814
Posted: Fri Mar 29 21:00:32 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 30-Mar-85 04:07:40 EST
References: <771@pyuxd.UUCP> <1349@akgua.UUCP>
Organization: STRONGARM COLLECTION AGENCY:  We have no slogan
Lines: 50

> OK Rich  -  How do we please you ?
> If we denounce Mr. Black (Wingate and me),
> we don't really really count 'cause we are
> perhaps "cleansing" ourselves.
> What do you want ?  I said basically he was a vile Anti-Semite
> (perhaps I was redundant ?).
> 
> Do I have to use obscenities to really, really make it more than
> mild ??

The object isn't to please me.  (If that's what you're doing, then it's
certainly not worth it.)  The object is to stand up and be counted
as being against bigotry (the way I thought Christians were supposed
to be) and against hate (ditto) as coming from people who engage in
both AND CALL IT CHRISTIAN.  He's one of you!!!  Like it or not!
The labels applied internally ("he's not an 'xxxx'") don't hold water
when the world looks on.  There are people who are beginning to believe
that what he has to say is quite Christian.  And his support (and support
for his movements) are growing among---you guessed it---the most
religious and devout Christians (or so they say) of all.  Until Christians
by the truckload stand up and say loudly "That is not what Christianity
is about", it will BECOME what Christianity is ALL about in this country.
As it became what Christianity was all about in times past.  I can't stress
that enough.

I know both you and Wingate, the only ones who had all that much to say
(up until that point), had been labelled anti-Semitic and it's more than
reasonable to speculate that part of your reason to speak out was as an
act of self-cleansing.  I apologize for insinuating that that was the ONLY
reason for your doing so.  I recall a certain mailing I received from a
Mr. Brown some years ago (from your site, or was it 'itm'?)  and I recall
a certain attempt at humor by a Marylander on this net.  Seeds of anti-Semitism
that are supposedly gone from modern Christian teaching still exist for
many Christians deep down, as passed on through families, etc.  and (as I
said to Wingate in private mail) I don't pin blame for the conditioned
beliefs a person retained, but I'd hope that even in people where such
beliefs are still strong, there is a voice of reason that can help them
overcome them, and see human beings as human beings.

> I tend to believe that your mind is made up about Christians, christians
> "christians", and CHRISTIANS.

Those are Wingate's sublabellings, not mine.  Yes, I have my prejudices, too,
and among them is the notion that such Christians as I've described above
either truly don't care or really are anti-Semitic (actually anti-everything
non-Christian).  I hope I am proven wrong, because our lives in effect
depend on it.
-- 
"Which three books would *you* have taken?"
				Rich Rosen	ihnp4!pyuxd!rlr