If they know of him at all, many folks think Ben Stein is just a quirky actor and comedian who talks in a monotone. He's also a very intelligent attorney who knows how to put ideas and words together in such a way as to sway juries and make people think clearly. The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.
Here at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart: I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are. I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I am buying my dog biscuits and kitty litter. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores. They never know who Nick and Jessica are either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they have broken up? Why are they so important?
I don't know who Lindsay Lohan is either, and I do not care at all about Tom Cruise's wife.
Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I am a subversive? Maybe, but I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are.
If this is what it means to be no longer young. It's not so bad.
Next confession:
I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don' t feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees.
It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.
I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution, and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.
Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him?
I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too.
But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.
In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.
Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her "How could God let something like this Happen?" (regarding Katrina)
Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, "I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives.
And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?"
In light of recent events...terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK.
Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.
If they know of him at all, many folks think Ben Stein is just a quirky actor and comedian who talks in a monotone. He's also a very intelligent attorney who knows how to put ideas and words together in such a way as to sway juries and make people think clearly. The following was written by Ben Stein and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.
Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about and we said OK.
Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.
Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with "WE REAP WHAT WE SOW."
Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell.
Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says.
Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing.
Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.
Are you laughing?
Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.
Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.
Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.
Sign up for my free WEEKLY STORM REPORT and receive a synopsis of the most important weekly news revealing the intimidation, infiltration and disinformation tactics used to soften-up the non-Muslim world for domination.
7 comments:
I'm sorry, WC, but the notion that the all powerful God of Creation decided to bow out in a snit and let Katrina happen because kids don't pray to him in public schools is about the silliest thing I have heard in a long time, even from a source like that. And it is insulting to me as an American and an atheist to suggest that people like me are responsible for the culture being in such a state that people can't recognize a danger like Islamofascism. Obviously, if that were true I would be posting on Kos and not here. And btw, many of the most rabid multiculturalists, Iraq-protestors, Bush-bashers, and It's-a-religion-of-peace dupes in my town hang out in churches.
Several of the bloggers and people on anti-jihad sites on the net are my fellow Objectivists and those of similar outlook, some of whom I have known for 40 years. I'm pleased and proud to see them in this fight, but not surprised. I would have expected nothing else.
You can "share the Lord" all you want, WC. Just have a thick skin and don't expect those of us who don't share your belief to bow our heads and slink away under a burden of unearned guilt. I try to refrain from making comments about other religions because I think Islam is such an overwhelming danger that I need to put other disagreements aside for now. But that doesn't make me or anyone else like me a doormat.
RevereRidesAgain,
I love having you around, and I am a Christian. Please accept that many of us have different opinions. But, we are united in our love for freedom of choice and that's why we are fighting the counter-Jihad.
For my part, I understand WC to be saying that a country which rejects faith is a country which does not have much of a right to expect anything of God.
For those who believe in God, that makes sense. For those who don't, why, of course it is silly.
And, that's ok.
Like I said, we are united in a love for freedom of choice.
That's fine, dear. But it is difficult to maintain that united feeling with people who attack you as part of the problem.
As Islamism becomes an increasingly obvious danger it will be important to maintain focus on the nature of that danger, tempting as it may be to indulge in recriminations against fellow Americans. The Islamists have been plotting this for decades, way before most of us even saw a glimmer on the horizon. We can certainly argue about what has made us so vulnerable, but, as Dan Simmons says in "Century War", tearing at each other won't help us stand up to the enemy.
Your point is well-taken. I'm not sure this article is attacking atheism so much as it is attacking atheists who reject public displays of religious faith. Am I reading it wrong in your opinion?
Here is the reason why not all the posts on my blog appear here. I first check if they fit the global view of IBA. I'm sure I've made an error of judgment at least once, but in general, those of my posts that are clearly and exclusively from the Orthodox Jewish point of view aren't seen on IBA. On your own blog you write whatever you wish; on a public grouping of blogs, there's the goals of the grouping to stick to. In one instance, when Reliapundit invited me to be a poster on Astute Bloggers, I turned the invitation down because I figured out I couldn't abide by the goals.
Well, that's a good point. Knowing WC, I don't think he is trying to condemn all atheists, but I guess I shouldn't speak for him.
Whoa! Boy what a maelstrom. Let me make myself clear on the post. First of all, I'm not a religious person at all. I don't like organized religion. I was raised a Roman Catholic and went through Catholic elementary school then a Jesuit H.S. that did for me as far as Catholicism was concerned.
I believe in spirituality. The post had a lot of truth in it but I was not promoting any religion of religion at all. Most of it detailed very well the lack of spirituality we have in this country and the false gods that the common culture worships. I would never propose replacing one extreme – leftist secularism – with another – fundamentalism. I believe there is a higher reality or truth, but it’s not a person, place or thing but a state of being that is attainable by anyone willing to work for it.
As i s aid in previous posts to my blog, those that have no strong beliefs are easy prey for a culture that has strong beliefs.
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