Consider this from yesterday’s Washington Post …
“A group of prominent U.S. evangelical figures, including several of President Trump’s evangelical advisers, met Thursday with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, whose role in the killing of Washington Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi remains unclear.”
What strikes me about this is how these same evangelicals openly condemn women who have an abortion, take birth control, or leave their abusive husbands, but they are willing to meet with a man who has blood on his hands and is a known violator of human rights. Can anybody explain to me how a woman who refuses to be a punching bag is worse than a man who just this year threatened to behead a woman and her husband for being human rights activists? Or how the marriage of two men is somehow more terrible than the bombing of innocent men, women, and children in Yemen?
All indications are that Mohammed bin Salman authorized or ordered the brutal murder of Washington Post reporter Jamal Khashoggi last month, yet Donald Trump continues to throw his support behind bin Salman. And why? In part, because his friend, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked him to, but also because Trump has significant financial interests in Saudi Arabia. Trump has denigrated the leaders of many of the nations who are our allies, such as Canada, the UK and Germany, but at the same time, he is willing to befriend a cruel dictator … a man who almost certainly murdered one of our own.
That Trump is such an unconscionable ‘man’ should not surprise us, but I am highly confused by a group of so-called evangelical Christians who are willing to turn a blind eye to bin Salman’s many human rights violations and sit around the fireside chuckling and telling jokes as if he were just another of the ‘good ol’ boys’.
Just as an aside, does anybody remember that 15 of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 came from Saudi Arabia?
The Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act allows the president to impose sanctions, including freezing of assets, against individuals or entities responsible for or acting as an agent for someone responsible for “extrajudicial killings, torture, or other gross violations of internationally recognized human rights,” or if they are government officials or senior associates of government officials complicit in “acts of significant corruption.” In other words, Trump could freeze any assets held in the U.S. by the Saudi government or by bin Salman. Instead, Trump sends a delegation of his trusted ‘religious advisors’.
The group was led by author/activist Joel Rosenberg (pictured at top). As to why they agreed to meet with bin Salman, an article in Religious News Service (RNS) sums it up …
“U.S. evangelical leaders decided to meet with the Saudi crown prince despite the Khashoggi controversy because Saudi Arabia is among the wealthiest, most powerful, and most important nations in the Middle East, in all of history.”
So … still have any doubts about what takes precedence in the evangelical community?
The Saudi royal family is consistently ranked among the “worst of the worst” in Freedom House’s annual survey of political and civil rights. Their human rights violations include capital punishment, torture, human trafficking, censorship and imprisonment of journalists, killing of homosexuals and transgenders, and the list goes on. But, the religious leaders seem to have no problem overlooking those minor details.
Trump’s evangelical advisory board has come under fire before for having tested the limits of separation of church and state by advising Trump and White House staff on issues including taxes, health care and judicial appointments. And now, they are assisting in setting foreign policy, supporting a cruel dictator. Ah well, they’ve been turning a blind eye to Trump and his obscene behaviour for two years now, so what’s a little bit of murder, beheading and dismemberment among friends, eh? Especially when there’s a profit to be turned.
But then … the school’s administrator, Sue Book, wiped that smile right off CJ’s little face when she sent him home for having long hair, or more likely for having dreadlocks.
CJ’s father wisely told the school, after a few attempts to reach some form of compromise, to remove his son from their roster, for he will not have anything to do with the school.
School officials told Faith on the first day of school that her hairstyle did not align with school policy. So, the next day Faith changed her hair, spending a “considerable amount of money in the process”, but still the school officials were not satisfied, and Faith was told to pack her belongings, leave, and don’t come back. It should be noted that Faith has worn the braids she began school with for the past two years … at the same school … but this year she was told they were “unnatural”.
“Separation of church and state” is paraphrased from Thomas Jefferson and used by others expressing an understanding of the intent and function of the Establishment Clause and Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States which reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…”
In the course of the article, Dr. James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, recounted a June meeting in which he met with Trump and other Christian leaders at Trump Tower in New York City. While reading 
One of the things that disturbs me most is that it appears Mr. Dobson does not understand that ours is a secular government. Public schools are government organizations, and as such, the reading of a Christian text, the Bible, or the reciting of Christian prayers must be prohibited, otherwise it forces children of other faiths to participate in a religion that is not their own. Parents who want their children to read the Bible in school have other options, i.e. parochial schools or homeschooling.
What do you call a judge who refuses to follow the law? Suspended without pay. Such is the case of Alabama Chief Supreme Court Justice, Roy Moore. Moore’s suspension is for the remainder of his term, which ends in 2019, at which time he will not be able to seek re-election due to age restrictions. Justice Moore decided that the law should take a backseat to his own personal religious beliefs, and this is the price he pays for that decision.
Moore is not without supporters, many of whom were angered by the ruling, claiming his suspension is “an unbelievable violation of the law.” Moore blames the Southern Poverty Law Center and “atheists, homosexuals and transgender individuals” for the charges that led to his suspension. Sorry, Mr. Moore … you have only yourself to blame and it should have happened years ago. Judges are sworn to uphold the law, not to override the law with their own personal prejudices.
Immigrants and refugees are also targets of bigotry, again enhanced by the hate-filled rhetoric that is bandied about as a result of the current political climate. Just as with any other group of humans, there are a few bad apples, but most refugees and immigrants came here hoping to build a life that would be safer than their old life, and instead they are finding danger lurks in the form of bigoted citizenry who have been told, and believe, that every Mexican is a rapist or murderer, and every Middle-Easterner is a terrorist.
In order to prepare for any potential role in government, especially the highest office in the land, Donald Trump needs political advisors. He needs foreign policy advisors, economic advisors, national security advisors, but he does not need religious advisors. In fact, it is highly inappropriate for him to form his potential governmental policies based on the advice of a small handful of people from a single religion! It is unconstitutional!
Filosofa's Word 