Three quite thuggish articles in as many days demonstrate that anti-Christian bigotry is alive and well in our mainstream media. All three pour contempt on Christians who dare to express their faith in public. All three are basically hate pieces which offer very little of substance, but plenty of ugly mud-slinging and abuse.
The first hatchet job comes from Anthony Sharwood writing for The Punch. He seems to hate the fact that American footballer Tim Tebow actually expresses his views in public. Thus his piece, “A football field is no place for nutty religious fanaticism” is one long vitriolic attack on Tebow and anyone else who does not fit into his mould.
The entire article offered nothing constructive or helpful. Let me just cite one paragraph: “The fact is, there is something vulgar about wearing your religiousness on your sleeve. It’s like rooting in public. It’s not right. Get a room. Or more to the point, get a church.”
What an ugly, twisted and despicable remark for this theophobe to make. So it is “vulgar” to express your faith in public? So when Jesus publically healed people who had been crippled all their life that was vulgar? When William Wilberforce took his faith into Parliament to fight for blacks, and to set the slaves free, he was just being vulgar?
When Mother Teresa fed, clothed and looked after the dying poor in the slums of Calcutta, she was being vulgar? When Martin Luther King publically affirmed his faith in the struggle for civil rights, he was being vulgar? When a Christian athlete gives a very quick and innocuous vote of thanks to his God for help on the field, that is vulgarity?
Sorry Anthony, but the only thing I can see that is vulgar is your article. I have already written about Tebow on other occasions, so let me just mention a passage from another Australian writer who was not ashamed to give Tebow some credit. Says Janet Albrechtsen,
“How irritating for critics that Tebow doesn’t look or sound like some kooky Southern preacher. Comedians who poke fun at him and so-called intellectuals among left-liberals who do the same, express a particular kind of contempt for a clean-living, pro-life, evangelical Christian sportsman. It seems they are more comfortable with some schlock celebrity who wears no underwear, has had an abortion, chilled out in an addiction clinic, been arrested for shoplifting or otherwise challenged social mores than a committed Christian and his public display of piety….
“The gulf between those who admire Tebow and those who ridicule him is not really a religious v secularist contest. It’s more a free v unfree fight. Fortunately, most Americans tend to take their freedom seriously.
“But if you thought religion in schools causes freedom-cynics in fashionably progressive circles to arch up in disgust, you should see what happens when religion makes its way on to the football field. As one Tebow admirer put it recently, Tebowmania is the ninth circle of hell for American left-liberals; it doesn’t get much worse than this. Just by being a nice, clean-living guy who walks the Christian talk with his missionary and charity work Tebow is one heck of a weapon against secularists who wouldn’t dream of ridiculing any religion except Christianity.”
The second and third examples of ugly anti-Christian bigotry came in yesterday’s Herald Sun. Not content to offer just one attack, they decided to give us two for the price of one. The first was by the paper’s resident God-hater, Jill Singer. She takes some rather nasty pot shots at pro-life feminist Melinda Tankard-Reist.
It seems the great sin of MTR, according to Ms Singer, is that her beliefs are informed by a worldview. But even worse than that, it is a Christian worldview, horror of horrors. I sent in a letter to the HS about this, but am not holding my breath.
It is very hard to get a letter into the HS that takes an alternative point of view. So let me offer it here, so that it at least gets some light of day: “Jill Singer throws a hissy fit because Melinda Tankard Reist has a worldview! And Jill doesn’t? Puh-leeese. Everyone has a worldview; for Jill it is secular humanism. Why is Jill allowed to push her worldview and agenda in public, while MTR apparently is not?”
That Ms Singer can get away with all this, apparently with a straight face, and for the HS to allow all this nasty Christophobia is quite mind-boggling. Given that the great majority of Australians are Christian, meaning that the great majority of HS readers are Christian, just what does the HS think it is doing?
Indeed, if all this was not bad enough, they had another ugly piece on the same day and on the same page, this time by a certain Rob Mitchell, attacking Margaret Court for daring to express her Christian faith in public. Because she takes the biblical stand on human sexuality, and is opposed to same-sex marriage, Mitchell tears into her.
And he does so by presenting just about every falsehood in the book. He parrots all the old furphies about higher suicide rates being due to “homophobia” and that “if you remove the discrimination and homophobic abuse, very quickly the mental health of these young people improves.”
What is it called when you pass on myth as truth? As I document in my new book, none of this happens to be true. Places where homosexuality is widely accepted, such as San Francisco, Amsterdam, or Sydney, have higher than average rates of suicide and mental health problems for homosexuals just like everywhere else. It has nothing to do with “homophobia” and everything to do with an unnatural, dangerous and high-risk lifestyle.
Of course the more honest homosexuals admit all this, as I fully document in my book. But the Christophobes will simply ignore the evidence and keep on shooting the messenger, whether it is me or Margaret Court. But what do we expect from the MSM and their activist cohorts?
So well done HS for a double dose of Christian-bashing and militant agenda setting. All you have to do is get rid of conservative columnist Andrew Bolt and your editorial stance will be right up there with all the other leftist MSM outlets in Australia. Then you can really go to town in attacking those pesky Christians for daring to speak their mind in public.
http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/a-football-field-is-no-place-for-nutty-religious-fanaticism/
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/the-lords-quarterback-strikes-fear-into-liberals/story-e6frg7bo-1226246753791
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/unholy-row-for-feminism-high-ground/story-e6frfhqf-1226246796771
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/time-for-leadership-after-courts-serve/story-e6frfhqf-1226246799492
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