Religious Intolerance

Today is President Obama's second Inauguration Day. I've watched some of it on television and read much about it in social media and regular online media. This is a fascinating spectacle of America.

When transfer of power takes place around the world and we see it here in America, we often comment on the military victory that took place to enable the power grab. Sometimes America benefits from the change of leadership, sometimes not. The display of power gets our attention and we make conclusions about the advanced status or backwardness of the culture.

I wonder what the world thinks about the USA today. Do they want to be like us? Do they think these constant elections are silly? Do they celebrate that the President gets a second term or do they think the world is coming to an end? Just something to think about.

My curiosity led me to a Google search for quotes from Inaugural addresses. Hear from Thomas Jefferson from March 4, 1801.

"Let us, then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions."

Religious intolerance was once banished from our land, so says our third President, but that is no longer the case. Today, if I say that I am against gay marriage because the Bible teaches that homosexuality is a sin, my religious beliefs are not tolerated. If I say that I support the life of the unborn child because of the teachings found in the Bible, then my religious beliefs are not tolerated. If Jefferson was right about freedom of religion in 1801, he would not be able to say the same thing about America in 2013 because religious liberty has come to mean "freedom from biblical Christianity."

Christians, as you pray for The Persecuted Church you should think about including Jesus-followers in America. And do not treat people who have opposing views with contempt. Instead, speak the truth in love. Interact with them as Jesus would - with grace.