February 19, 2013
Today’s Standards
In a recent
letter-to-the-editor a woman used a shotgun approach to attack every
conservative stance that she found objectionable. On marriage she said, “I don’t think the Creator had anything to
do with the institution of marriage. It’s a societal necessity, not a rite of
‘God’.” She went on to suggest that by today’s standards, we should allow
the ‘commitment ceremony’ of marriage to be extended to same sex couples.
Certainly she is entitled to her opinion, but she is not entitled to go
unchallenged when she elevates her opinion to be above the Word of God. People
of faith understand that God instituted marriage between a man and a woman, not
as a rite, but rather as a right. The letter writer is a stumbling block when
she asks us to believe that today’s standards somehow overrides God’s Word.
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Gail;
-----Nothing grates against my nerves more than this saying that everyone has a right to their own opinion. I might better tolerate the idea that everybody has a right to hold their own opinion short of expressing it. But even that is problematic. There really is no such thing as an unexpressed, “only held” opinion. What a person thinks makes the person. And what makes the person makes what the person does. And what the person does effects others. Thankfully, our rights to do unto others are legally restricted.
-----Then, I suppose two matters are relevant, one being the definition of an opinion, and the other being what right God gives. Does everyone have a right to put forth an opinion as a law, like what a judge hands down? I hope not. The same goes for the opinion of a brain surgeon. You might give anyone the right to such an opinion, as long as he has no right to either a scalpel or to sway the doctor wielding it (as does ObamaCare.)
-----Of course the rights to such opinions are restricted! What grates my nerves is the right to any old view based solely upon personal judgment. This extends from the attitude that truth is what a person thinks he knows because that's what he's wanted to know. It reminds me of Paul’s opinion, “If any one imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know.” (I Cor 8:2) A person knows only when he really knows. Then our real rights are to actual knowledge. Until we get such, we also have a right to learning and careful analysis of facts and information. Instead of the right to an opinion, we have an obligation to the truth.
-----But what chafes me more is that this “right to an opinion” is the most restricted by the very people who propound it the loudest. Many people, mostly in the sports world (for very real reasons) have lost fortunes and jobs and businesses because of much less than stated opinions. The blurt of an endearing expression like, “...look at that little monkey run!” is manufactured into evidence for racist opinions, and therefore, the necessity to fire Howard Cosell, though he held not the opinion he should have had “the right” to hold if he indeed had held it. No. It isn’t the right to opinions we seize, it is the right to hypocrisy.
-----What right does God give us? Take the question to its ultimate, then turn around and behold the perspective. God gives us the right to go to Hell, the finish line of opinions, of one's own understandings. But God also gives us the right to repent and turn from our own opinions to His, and to search for truth like gold. God gave man the right to turn found truths into understanding. Truth has awareness. In fact, it has a name. It seeks everyone who seeks it. And it finds what it seeks. So, it is far less dangerous to claim a right to humility for a search together than it is to claim the right to an opinion.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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