The Christian Left is a group devoted to informing their site’s and Facebook page’s visitors that there is such a thing as the Christian Left. They quote a verse from the Parable of the Good Samaritan: “Jesus told him, ‘Go and do likewise,'” (Luke 10:37). Their mission is “[t]o follow Jesus by taking actions on behalf of the oppressed, the sick, the hungry, the poor, the incarcerated, the lonely, the disabled, the mentally ill, the mistreated, the war-torn, and the weak.”
Hmm, what is missing here? Oh, right: the unborn.
What’s wrong with The Christian Left, though, is not just that they neglect to include the unborn in those on whose behalf we should act, as Jesus would do. After all, one could imagine they could include the unborn under the “oppressed” label.
But no, the worst part is that they advocate for abortion. And they do so while demonizing the Christian right.
On their homepage, under “What We’re All About,” The Christian Left mentions, with original emphasis, that:
We’re not about Dogma here. We’re just Christians who think the political and Christian right-wing have their priorities wrong.
Bottom Line: We welcome ALL to their place at God’s table, just as they are. All means ALL. No exceptions. We reject all attempts to define our Faith by the two wedge issues of Gay Marriage and Abortion.
So The Christian Left doesn’t want to be defined by “Gay Marriage” and “Abortion,” while suggesting that that’s what the Christian right is defined by – whose adherents also, according to The Christian Left, “have their priorities wrong.” Well, for a group that doesn’t want to be defined by these “wedge issues,” they certainly spend plenty of time talking about them – on their website, their blog and their Facebook page.
Now, the Facebook page and website and blog posts do discuss Christianity and Jesus Christ, but upon glancing through, there are a significant amount of anti-GOP and Christian right posts and links. It seems that The Christian Left are Christians, yes, but more leftist – and, I dare say, hell-bent on pointing out the faults of the Christian right and the GOP.
The Christian Left criticizes those Christians who deal with the issue of abortion with such posts as this political cartoon and this picture in their timeline photos. They also shared this link from the Huffington Post about sex education programs, as well as this meme about being pro-life and against universal health care.
There are also these posts on the group’s Facebook page:
As a child, when I went to church with my grandmother, we never heard sermons about abortion or homosexuality. It was all about Jesus. That changed sometime near the election of Ronald Reagan when politicians figured out some people could be ‘useful idiots’ by dividing us on these issues while we were being shafted behind the scenes. I don’t remember one sermon about either subject, ever. – Laurie Ann Giampietro, member of The Christian Left [TCL: Many of these same Christians have now turned these two wedge issues into their own personal ego idols. Jesus has been blurred out of the picture entirely.]
These “useful idiots” acted on their faith in being against abortion and/or homosexuality, or at the very least they sought to appeal to those who did act on their faith. Jesus has not “been blurred out of the picture entirely” in discussing these issues.
It actually very much concerns me that a church would fail to discuss abortion. When there is no mention, it seems that the church would prefer to sweep the issue under the rug and pretend that abortions aren’t happening. On the other hand, when the church preaches against abortion, it’s to remind Christians that abortion is not something Jesus would ever support, as well as that there is healing and forgiveness available for those who have suffered from abortion. But The Christian Left doesn’t want you to know that.
And now for perhaps the most startling post of all from the group, which shows that its members very much fail to understand their professed religion and leader, Jesus Christ:
To those who come by the page to lecture us about abortion and gay marriage, please take it somewhere else. Being gay isn’t a sin. Abortion isn’t a sin. You and your false teachers need to get a grip. Learn the truth. We’re moving on. You’ve dragged Christianity down long enough with your bigoted views and need to control women. Start with Numbers 5. In it you will find the description of a Bible sanctioned abortion.
Here we see that The Christian Left is at it again, criticizing those they disagree with by calling pro-lifers bigots. And perhaps the reason Christians who are faithful on the issue of abortion, and who understand that it is something God and His Son could never support, seek to “lecture” is because The Christian Left is so very wrong. Yet this group will have none of it, and its members seem so sure of their stance, even when it couldn’t be farther from the truth. As this page points out (warning: graphic pictures) and this one, abortion is indeed a sin. And while pro-choice Bible studies like to point out that abortion is sanctioned, other pages will point out that this is simply untrue.
What I see at the heart of the issue is this, though: it is bad enough to claim to be a Christian and be in support of abortion. It gets worse when you claim to be a Christian, are in support of abortion, and say that any other Christian who is pro-life has his or her priorities wrong and is a bigot. Being Christian really ought to mean being pro-life. Do I believe that there can be Christians who are left-leaning? I do. The Christian Left can stop trying to convince us that it’s possible.
Just don’t tell me that “[a]bortion is not a sin” when I know that it is. And it is outright deceitful for such a group to sell to other Christians, with such certainty and authority, that they can rightfully be Christian and support abortion.
It’s funny how such a group refers to “political and Christian right-wing” as the ones who “have their priorities wrong[,]“ as if they don’t want to be associated with such terms. Yet this is a group that could easily be categorized as political. And they say they reject being defined by these issues?
Well, they seem to be defined by defining other groups by these issues, all while also discussing these issues, just from another standpoint which isn’t exactly compatible with Christianity. Thus, they’re defined not only by criticizing people for believing that abortion is a sin, which it is, but also by their fervent and misguided support.
If The Christian Left has anything to say about this blog post, they’ll likely call me out for being a Republican and a bigot and wrong and judgmental and whatever else they can think of. Well, I say let them.
