I apreciate Stephen Polley’s excellent videography even though he gave me an extra “s” thus making me Less than Les 
Anyway, I was given 10 minutes to speak at a TEA Party Health Care Forum in Tupelo. Here’s a video of the Speech for those who are interested.
Great job Brother Leslie! Also the Obama health care is a smoke and mirrors ploy to insure the morally perverted sodomites that have pre-existing conditions such as aids or HIV. Covering them under his healthcare plan will continue to bankrupt this nation.
By: Gary McGee on August 28, 2009
at 5:33 am
Dear Riley’s father,
I understand your well articulated opposition to the Health Insurance reforms, but I would like you to consider some other arguments.
1. Government mismanagement and financial disaster: You bring up Amtrak, the post office, and social security, but why don’t you bring up the military? We give a lot of tax money to our military budget because we assume they have the expertise to defend us, and we do not expect the military to make a profit. It is a loss that we accept as citizens. The Health care industry as it is now maintained is financially mismanaged. It is not sustainable in its current form. All the experts, from all sides of the political spectrum agree on this point. We either reform it now- while we have time to think about it and put in our ideas, or we wait until they come running and screaming to us to rescue them, as our recently unregulated banking industry demonstrated so well.
2. Death Panels and abortion. Abortions are not allowed in the current bill, as they are not allowed in Medicare. The death panel referred to doctors having discussions with patients about how they wanted to be treated at the end of their life. If the patient says “Do everything to keep me alive”, then by law the doctor would have to do that.
3. You are correct that health care is not in the Constitution, and while “all men are created equal” is in there, we had to amend the Constitution to allow blacks and women to vote. You say that you oppose rights coming from the majority. Well, now the majority of Americans have health insurance, only 20% do not. In 1860, 13% of the population were slaves, the majority had freedom. We went to war to give that minority their freedom. How we will help the 20% that cannot get health insurance?
4. As a Christian, you oppose health insurance reforms. Wasn’t a big part of Jesus’ ministry helping the sick? Jesus didn’t ask if people were rich or poor, he helped everyone and he asked us to understand the spiritual aspect of healing. You should take a look at faithforhealth.com.
I am biased. My father owned a small construction business and could never get affordable health insurance for my family. When my mother (who stayed at home and took care of us kids) died of metastatic breast cancer, in addition to the grief of having lost his wife, he had $400,000 in upaid medical bills. It was the kind of annihilation you wouldn’t want on your worst enemy.
I don’t expect President Obama or the Democrats to do anything for us- if they get this reform right it will be because we the people gave our representatives CONSTRUCTIVE input. We need to write to them and tell them what we WANT and what we DON’T WANT to reform this sick Health Insurance system.
There is no way to predict what this will eventually cost. The current system is completely broken, and there is no empirical evidence for how a new system will work. However, we can look to other countries that do have National Systems and learn from their successes and mistakes. A good place to start is the Swiss, they are very much like us (own more guns than we do, in the middle of Europe but refuse to join the EU, women couldn’t vote until 1971, lots of capitalism & pharmaceutical companies). Half of their people were uninsured, but in 1994 they switched to a National Health system by a narrow majority. Their insurance and pharmaceutical companies didn’t go bankrupt, and they are doing ok. But you don’t have to listen to me, do the research for yourself.
You may write me off as a nut case, but consider me a Warner. My judgment counts for nothing, but on the Last Day, will you be able to account for yourself to God when he asks you, “Why didn’t you care for my sick children?”
By: N Rehman on September 1, 2009
at 12:34 pm
Hello N Rehman,
I would like to respond to your last paragraph:
“but on the Last Day, will you be able to account for yourself to God when he asks you, “Why didn’t you care for my sick children?” I assume you are referring to Matthew 25 where Jesus was speaking to his disciples.
In Matthew 25 Jesus was speaking to individuals and on judgment day all individuals will be judged for their deeds including care for the sick. Jesus does not expect us to pass that responsibility to the government.
God does not want me to ignore my responsibilities and set up a government program to care for the sick. He expects individuals to care for the sick.
Whose responsibility is it to care for the sick?
1. Each one should care for his own family. “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” 1 Timothy 5:8
2. Within our churches we can care for each other who are members of that church
3. Individuals can care for others (including unbelievers) and through this maybe God will draw the sick unbeliever to Himself
Yes God will hold each of us accountable for our actions. But we are not acting biblically if we ask Uncle Sam to do the job we are called to do.
It is stealing when the government takes money from one person to pay the expenses of someone else. God hates stealing and included it as the 8th commandment “You shall not steal”. Instead God expects us to cheerfully and willingly obey Him. Whether that is in the giving of our time, money, etc. “Each one must do just as he has purposed in his heart, not grudgingly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” 2 Corinthians 9:7
By: Brian on September 2, 2009
at 9:58 pm
N Rehman :
My comments are mixed below. FWIW, I do not have insurance but I do have health care. I pay for it myself. And no I’m not rich either. I make about 45K a year and provide for a wife and 6 children.
Quote:
Dear Riley’s father,
I understand your well articulated opposition to the Health Insurance reforms, but I would like you to consider some other arguments.
1. Government mismanagement and financial disaster: You bring up Amtrak, the post office, and social security, but why don’t you bring up the military? We give a lot of tax money to our military budget because we assume they have the expertise to defend us, and we do not expect the military to make a profit. It is a loss that we accept as citizens. The Health care industry as it is now maintained is financially mismanaged. It is not sustainable in its current form. All the experts, from all sides of the political spectrum agree on this point. We either reform it now- while we have time to think about it and put in our ideas, or we wait until they come running and screaming to us to rescue them, as our recently unregulated banking industry demonstrated so well.
The military is specifically a function of national government authorized both scripturally and Constitutionaly. Your comparison between the military and universal health care is apples and oranges.
Your Argumentum ad numerum (argument or appeal to numbers) regarding the experts in the Health care industry is a fallacious argument because it assumes that your way is the only way to solve the problem.
Quote:
2. Death Panels and abortion. Abortions are not allowed in the current bill, as they are not allowed in Medicare. The death panel referred to doctors having discussions with patients about how they wanted to be treated at the end of their life. If the patient says “Do everything to keep me alive”, then by law the doctor would have to do that.
I haven’t read the whole bill and I doubt if you have either. Once the government takes over all heath care, abortion will be funded by the government. Whether it’s in the bill now or not is really immaterial. We know how Washington works and how universal health care systems work and in the end abortion will be funded. Furthermore, if health care is “free” for everyone, because there is only a limited amount of services and/or money available, there will be rationing just like in Canada and the UK. Obama’s administration has already reinstated end of life counseling (the Bush administration pulled it) for wounded soldiers that obviously has an angle on death as a solution.
Quote:
3. You are correct that health care is not in the Constitution, and while “all men are created equal” is in there, we had to amend the Constitution to allow blacks and women to vote. You say that you oppose rights coming from the majority. Well, now the majority of Americans have health insurance, only 20% do not. In 1860, 13% of the population were slaves, the majority had freedom. We went to war to give that minority their freedom. How we will help the 20% that cannot get health insurance?
The circular reasoning in the above statement is both amazing but more importantly false logic. Slavery and Universal Health care have nothing to do with each other.
Quote:
4. As a Christian, you oppose health insurance reforms. Wasn’t a big part of Jesus’ ministry helping the sick? Jesus didn’t ask if people were rich or poor, he helped everyone and he asked us to understand the spiritual aspect of healing. You should take a look at faithforhealth.com.
You have grossly misapplied the teachings of Jesus. Jesus never instructed anyone to use the force of government to tax a person’s personal income and then give that money to someone else for any reason, no not even for health care. Jesus helped and cured people personally. If you will follow Jesus then you should do likewise instead of using the state to force people at the point of a gun to give up their personal property to satisfy your agenda. Your Argumentum ad verecundiam (argument to authority) is exegetically false. Furthermore, Leslie and thousands of Christians and non-Christians have given their personal money to help the poor and the sick. Your Argumentum ad hominem directed at Leslie is false.
Quote:
I am biased. My father owned a small construction business and could never get affordable health insurance for my family. When my mother (who stayed at home and took care of us kids) died of metastatic breast cancer, in addition to the grief of having lost his wife, he had $400,000 in upaid medical bills. It was the kind of annihilation you wouldn’t want on your worst enemy.
I am very sorry for your family’s trials. However, your utopian vision for universal heath care doesn’t mean your mother would have received the medical care she needed in a timely manner. Countries who have adopted the system you propose ration their health care and people still die. I am sorry for your father’s financial troubles and as a Christian I’d be willing to donate to his financial relief but what gives you the right to use the federal government to take that money away from me, at the point of a gun, and give it to your father? The taxes that will have to be raised to support universal heath care are going to annihilate thousands of small business owned by tax paying Americans. Your Argumentum ad misericordiam (argument or appeal to pity) is yet another false argument but at least you admitted your bias.
Quote:
I don’t expect President Obama or the Democrats to do anything for us- if they get this reform right it will be because we the people gave our representatives CONSTRUCTIVE input. We need to write to them and tell them what we WANT and what we DON’T WANT to reform this sick Health Insurance system.
There is no way to predict what this will eventually cost. The current system is completely broken, and there is no empirical evidence for how a new system will work. However, we can look to other countries that do have National Systems and learn from their successes and mistakes. A good place to start is the Swiss, they are very much like us (own more guns than we do, in the middle of Europe but refuse to join the EU, women couldn’t vote until 1971, lots of capitalism & pharmaceutical companies). Half of their people were uninsured, but in 1994 they switched to a National Health system by a narrow majority. Their insurance and pharmaceutical companies didn’t go bankrupt, and they are doing ok. But you don’t have to listen to me, do the research for yourself.
I’ll pass. Leslie has shown more than enough evidence from our country’s bankrupt Medicare/Medicaid, US Post Office and Social Security departments to prove that OUR federal government can’t run anything without it going broke and becoming a completely mismanaged burden on OUR entire country. Furthermore, if you think Switzerland is that wonderful I seriously suggest you think about moving there. I suspect you’ll find it’s not the utopia you claim it to be.
Quote:
You may write me off as a nut case, but consider me a Warner. My judgment counts for nothing, but on the Last Day, will you be able to account for yourself to God when he asks you, “Why didn’t you care for my sick children?”
Suming up with both a false Argumentum ad verecundiam and Argumentum ad hominem does not impress me.
There are a number of free market reforms that are possible and will bring down the cost of health care. I did a quick search of the web and pasted it in below. The point is not that we have to do all of these but that there are other ways to reform health care than nationalizing it. You need to quit assuming that the Obama nationalize everything way is the only way.
1. Abolish the extensive health related tax structure. That includes abolishing all tax subsidies related to insurance.
2. Abolish ALL Federal Regulation of health care.
3. Abolish the Department of Health and Human Services.
4. Abolish Medicare and Medicaid.
5. Abolish SCHIP.
6. Abolish the FDA.
7. Abolish patent laws.
8. Abolish medical licensure.
9. Abolish all current tort law and return to common law torts.
10. Abolish all state and local regulation of health care.
11. Abolish Rx all drugs to be over the counter.
12. Abolish all regulation on insurance companies.
By: James Taylor on September 2, 2009
at 10:34 pm
“On Judgement Day, when God looks at His children and says “Come, you who are blessed by my Father… for I was hungry and you gave Me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited Me in, I needed clothes and you clothed Me, I was sick and you looked after Me, I was in prison and you came to visit Me.” I hope not to be the sheepish one in the corner saying “Thanks, Lord, I got the President and the American government to do all that for me… how’d they do?”
Jesus did work with the sick and the broken, but
He didn’t ask Caesar to do that for Him.
Let Caesar take care of his own business (which, by the way, is not Amtrak, the post office, or “social security” but does include the military).
By: Syd M on September 3, 2009
at 6:47 am
Quote:
Dear Riley’s father,
I understand your well articulated opposition to the Health Insurance reforms, but I would like you to consider some other arguments.
1. Government mismanagement and financial disaster: You bring up Amtrak, the post office, and social security, but why don’t you bring up the military? We give a lot of tax money to our military budget because we assume they have the expertise to defend us, and we do not expect the military to make a profit. It is a loss that we accept as citizens. The Health care industry as it is now maintained is financially mismanaged. It is not sustainable in its current form. All the experts, from all sides of the political spectrum agree on this point. We either reform it now- while we have time to think about it and put in our ideas, or we wait until they come running and screaming to us to rescue them, as our recently unregulated banking industry demonstrated so well.
THE reason the current health care industry is unsustainable is BECAUSE of government intervention, including Medicare and Medicaid. Both programs need to be ended. In fact, the government has no legitimate any field of medicine, other than the viable argument to protect the life and property of citizens by prohibiting dangerous pollution, prohibiting fraud, prohibiting malpractice where people are harmed by practitioners.
\
3. You are correct that health care is not in the Constitution, and while “all men are created equal” is in there, we had to amend the Constitution to allow blacks and women to vote. You say that you oppose rights coming from the majority. Well, now the majority of Americans have health insurance, only 20% do not. In 1860, 13% of the population were slaves, the majority had freedom. We went to war to give that minority their freedom. How we will help the 20% that cannot get health insurance?
3.1 One blanches at the ignorance of an American that thinks the War for Southern Independence was about slavery. How do you answer such a brainwashed person? The fact is that every Southerner was a POW following that war, and for the entire period of Reconstruction, when their private property was stripped away from them, almost completely. The CSA had already outlawed the importing of slaves, before the USA did. Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation did not free a single slave, since those slaves living in US-controlled territory were forced to continue in slavery until the end of the war, serving the Union. Let Ulysses S. Grant answer this bogus claim, “This war is not about slavery. If I thought for a minute that it was, I would resign my commission and offer my sword to the other side.” (Lincoln, himself, was a segregationist, whose plan to ship ALL former slaves back to Africa was interrupted only by his untimely death.)
3.2 Once you start thinking of things that people need, beyond the liberty to pursue Life, Liberty and Property, (and the concomitant RIGHT to fail that pursuit), then the list goes on until every desire is met by government. Is not food more basic than medical insurance? So we MUST guarantee food to all. We do that, in the form of welfare, WIC program, etc. What about shoes? What about Nike sports shoes? What about a Harley Davidson, or a Corvette? Where will you draw the line? Medicine, retirement, vacations, etc. There is only one system that dares to make all these promises — pure communism. “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
4. As a Christian, you oppose health insurance reforms. Wasn’t a big part of Jesus’ ministry helping the sick? Jesus didn’t ask if people were rich or poor, he helped everyone and he asked us to understand the spiritual aspect of healing. You should take a look at faithforhealth.com.
I am biased. My father owned a small construction business and could never get affordable health insurance for my family. When my mother (who stayed at home and took care of us kids) died of metastatic breast cancer, in addition to the grief of having lost his wife, he had $400,000 in upaid medical bills. It was the kind of annihilation you wouldn’t want on your worst enemy.
How very sad. We all have our tragedies in life. There are laws to provide for just this problem. It’s called “bankruptcy”. My own father kept us in poverty when he should have declared bankruptcy, but his sense of honor forbade it. Your father should have done the same thing. The fact is, your father chose to not afford insurance, like mine did. We had no insurance either. He used the money to buy food. But your father was not annihilated by medical bills. I’m sure he was devastated by the loss of your mother, but financially, Obamacare won’t help that problem.
I don’t expect President Obama or the Democrats to do anything for us- if they get this reform right it will be because we the people gave our representatives CONSTRUCTIVE input. We need to write to them and tell them what we WANT and what we DON’T WANT to reform this sick Health Insurance system.
There is no way to predict what this will eventually cost. The current system is completely broken, and there is no empirical evidence for how a new system will work. However, we can look to other countries that do have National Systems and learn from their successes and mistakes. A good place to start is the Swiss, they are very much like us (own more guns than we do, in the middle of Europe but refuse to join the EU,
Switzerland is now a member of the EU.
women couldn’t vote until 1971, lots of capitalism & pharmaceutical companies). Half of their people were uninsured, but in 1994 they switched to a National Health system by a narrow majority. Their insurance and pharmaceutical companies didn’t go bankrupt, and they are doing ok. But you don’t have to listen to me, do the research for yourself.
You may write me off as a nut case, but consider me a Warner. My judgment counts for nothing, but on the Last Day, will you be able to account for yourself to God when he asks you, “Why didn’t you care for my sick children?”
This is hollow rhetoric designed to lay a guilt trip on those who don’t agree with a program of mandatory kindness. The Church certainly does have a great duty to minister to the sick, the poor, the widows, the orphans. Even though Jesus said we will always have them, we must minister to them. But to do it through FORCE, at the point of a gun (government force), then all virtue has been removed from it, and the churches of America have abdicated the field of charity work to the government, for just that reason.
By: Dan New on September 3, 2009
at 6:53 am
Quote:
Dear Riley’s father,
I understand your well articulated opposition to the Health Insurance reforms, but I would like you to consider some other arguments.
1. Government mismanagement and financial disaster: You bring up Amtrak, the post office, and social security, but why don’t you bring up the military? We give a lot of tax money to our military budget because we assume they have the expertise to defend us, and we do not expect the military to make a profit. It is a loss that we accept as citizens.
What does the Bible have to say about financing a standing army vs. having state militias? What is the biblical role of an army?
The Health care industry as it is now maintained is financially mismanaged. It is not sustainable in its current form. All the experts, from all sides of the political spectrum agree on this point. We either reform it now- while we have time to think about it and put in our ideas, or we wait until they come running and screaming to us to rescue them, as our recently unregulated banking industry demonstrated so well.
Scripture consistently promotes the personal liberty of self-government, not slavery to a central government. The sphere of the central govenment is commanded by God to protect its citizens from invasion, and to keep our communities safe. This would include keeping our food, drinking water, and medical care safe…but nowhere is the central government given the charge to run the entire health care industry.
As far as the banking industry is concerned, what does the Bible say about “just weights and balances” and how has the FDIC managed the banks according to that biblical truth. The answer to that is why they are failing, and why they should not have been “bailed out.”
3. You are correct that health care is not in the Constitution, and while “all men are created equal” is in there, we had to amend the Constitution to allow blacks and women to vote.
What does the Bible say about a man being in charge of his household and how does allowing wives to vote oppose that truth?
What does the Bible *and most if not all or America’s original state constitutions) say about only allowing property owners to vote and how does allowing anyone to vote just because they are living and breathing violate God’s Word?
You say that you oppose rights coming from the majority. Well, now the majority of Americans have health insurance, only 20% do not. In 1860, 13% of the population were slaves, the majority had freedom.
As the saying goes, “Whover wins the war gets to write the history books,” but I would encourage you to read some accurate history books and he will find that The War of Northern Aggression was not fought to end slavery.
We went to war to give that minority their freedom. How we will help the 20% that cannot get health insurance?
4. As a Christian, you oppose health insurance reforms. Wasn’t a big part of Jesus’ ministry helping the sick? Jesus didn’t ask if people were rich or poor, he helped everyone and he asked us to understand the spiritual aspect of healing. You should take a look at faithforhealth.com.
Why didn’t Jesus establish a department of national healthcare in Jerusalem, instead of urging the local congregations to look after the needs of their neighbors? Remember, biblical self-government, not tyrannical central government?
I am biased. My father owned a small construction business and could never get affordable health insurance for my family. When my mother (who stayed at home and took care of us kids) died of metastatic breast cancer, in addition to the grief of having lost his wife, he had $400,000 in upaid medical bills. It was the kind of annihilation you wouldn’t want on your worst enemy.
I don’t expect President Obama or the Democrats to do anything for us- if they get this reform right it will be because we the people gave our representatives CONSTRUCTIVE input. We need to write to them and tell them what we WANT and what we DON’T WANT to reform this sick Health Insurance system.
There is no way to predict what this will eventually cost. The current system is completely broken, and there is no empirical evidence for how a new system will work.
By the way just whom are your trusting to be your legislators…are they Christians with a Christian worldview, or are they non-Christians, or Christians who are legislating as though they are mere conservatives and have no respect for God’s laws? What has your church done to educate people in your community to run for an elective office and how they should legislate once they are elected? If your church says, “We can’t do that because that would violate our 501 c3 agreement with the state, ask “Why are you more concerned what the state thinks, than you are what God thinks? Are your follwoing Baal, or God?”
However, we can look to other countries that do have National Systems and learn from their successes and mistakes. A good place to start is the Swiss, they are very much like us (own more guns than we do, in the middle of Europe but refuse to join the EU, women couldn’t vote until 1971, lots of capitalism & pharmaceutical companies). Half of their people were uninsured, but in 1994 they switched to a National Health system by a narrow majority. Their insurance and pharmaceutical companies didn’t go bankrupt, and they are doing ok.
Here, you are not only depending upon man’s logic, instead of God’s, but you are disregarding the proven facts that all of these nationally run health care systems are inferior to America’s. Sure our costs are higher, but part of the cost we pay are the costs for research. Those countries benefit from the millions of dollars we spend for research. If America becomes a national heath care provider, the first way to cut spending, would be to cut back, or eliminate research. In other words, whatever we now know about curing diseases will be all we know. Is that what you want?
By: Buddy Hansen on September 3, 2009
at 7:00 am
Christians who support Health Care Reforms quote the following scriptures:
Ezekiel 34:4a, God points of the failures of leadership to Israel to care for the weak, “You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you have not bound up the injured”. As a result, all suffer
Matth 25: 31-(runs to 46) “We too are called to feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, shelter the homeless, clothe the naked, and comfort the sick and imprisoned”
Jeremiah 8:22 “Is there no Balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Whey then has the health of my poor people not been restored?”
Jeremiah 6:14-15 The Prophet lays responsibility on leaders of the community for economic corruption and careless attention to the wounded
with apathy and no compassion.
Ill persons may feel separated from God, Psalm 88
Luke 10:29-37 The Good Samaritan bandages the wounds of his neighbor, whoever the neighbor may be.
1 John 3:17 How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?
Matthew 25: 31-45 Jesus says that nations will be judged by how they treat “the least of them”.
Luke 9:6, Mark 7: 32-35 Jesus and his disciples demonstrate sharing Good News and healing the sick are bound up together.
Are these Christians wrong?
By: Judgement Day on September 3, 2009
at 8:15 am
Context. Context. Context.
By: rileydad on September 3, 2009
at 9:45 am
Hello N.,
I think that you have brought up some good points, but it is also important to listen to other comments on the blog.
1. Status of healthcare in the world:
The more I am reading about the status of the healthcare system, the more I am convinced that we need a change of the system. I checked out the facts, and you are correct about how the Swiss changed their healthcare system from a US style system to a nationalized system, and they now have even better healthcare. And by the way, you are correct in saying that the Switzerland is not member of the EU, but they have been considering joining it for a number of years. Dan’s source may just have gotten the facts, but that is not a big deal.
We sometimes think that being a patriot requires that we feel we are better than other countries. However, as true patriots we have to admit it when other countries get something right and we can learn from them.
I just read the book
“The Healing of America: A Global Quest for Better, Cheaper, and Fairer Health Care” by TR Reid, 2009, ISBN 1594202346.
This book has opened my eyes. As a conservative patriot and person of faith, my first instinct is to always assume that books highlighting problems in the USA and showing strengths in other countries are written by left-wing lunatic liberals. But this book is actually very well written, and it shows that the healthcare system is BETTER and CHEAPER in other countries when it is run by government. It took a lot of effort for me to actually accept my own flawed thinking about the US healthcare. I checked up on many facts in the book, and they seem to be true.
After getting all the facts straight, I feel government healthcare is the Christian and patriotic thing to do. When James Taylor says that if you like Switzerland’s healthcare, you should just move there, it is not productive. It is just like saying to Americans who oppose taxation, Medicare, medical licenses, FDA that they should move to countries in Africa which have no taxes and no government regulations. But Americans should not have to move. True American patriots stay in their country and make it a better place. And I think that any conservative person of faith that looks at the facts without pre-judging it based on our preconceived ideas will see the benefits of government run healthcare, because more sick and poor will covered, and it will be cheaper.
2. Faith and healthcare:
I posted some scriptural quotes, and riley dad uses the term context, context, context as a response. But the truth of the matter is that Jesus would have always advocated healing over killing, giving over taking. If we want to be truly pro-life, we need to advocate life in all forms; including life and health of living people who are ill and dying because they cannot afford healthcare. Caring for the sick is a moral question, and let us please not always get bogged down in debates about taxes. Of course we people of faith need to help others as INDIVIDUALS. God does not want us to always give all our responsibilities to the government. But if we are paying taxes, shouldn’t we make sure that those dollars are spent for healing the sick instead of engaging wars that kill. Wouldn’t that be the pro-life thing to do?
http://faithforhealth.org/
This faith-based website has helped me overcome my biases. I think God always wants us to help those in need. Since we are currently in a country with taxes and a federal government, let us at least make sure that those taxes are maximally spent to promote life and not war.
I see that others posting in this blog have anger and hatred in their hearts. But true salvation comes from love, not from anger and hatred. And if we sit down and go through all we think and write, and phrase by phrase check for whether it represents fear/anger/hatred or love, we will discover that a lot of our opposition to government healthcare is motivated by fear of government control and anger/hatred towards left-wing liberals. This may blind us to many good things, and government healthcare may be one of them.
By: Judgement Day on September 3, 2009
at 1:23 pm
I take a different angle on this–I reflect from a personal criticism of myself in this whole mess and look at history for some understanding of how we as a nation got here–AND What can we learn from it and prevent worse outcomes…
A History lesson, or…a look at our nation’s history, can reveal to us how the problems we now face with health care came about. No reform or bill passed will correct or remedy the situation-it may be bandaid-ed, but the gaping wound would still be there causing those who are in need to suffer.
Beginning with pre-WWI Great Depression era unto the present day reveals a growing shift from personal accountability/responsibility in all things (not just in caring for the sick) to a dependency and eventual EXPECTANCY upon government to resolve everything needed.
I think the Church’s brightest spotlight during the Great Depression was the Salvation Army soup kitchen. Strangely, most of the other local community churches were silent…even standing against helping those suffering during the beginning of the Great Depression. This vacuum opened the way for Government aid to enter and it has been shut to the church ever since…sadly, most of the church likes it this way. Really, would any of us deny the starving child a crust of bread if we had it to give…so, the church allowed the state to step in and help…the state did and now we are paying the consequences.
I remember when a man, who just came into our church off the street looking for help was directed by my pastor to another local agency, not affiliated with a church. His reasoning was that he didn’t want to misuse the money entrusted to him by parishioners on people that could use it for poor reasons. I am not double guessing the pastor–he may have seen something, as our pastor that I could not and made a decision–but at first glance it appeared heartless. We must be willing to risk everything to save just one.
As a Church we cannot and must not allow personal loss to keep us from fulfilling the Great commission. In the 20’s and 30’s the Church gave up its jurisdiction over needy families to the state…we MUST take it back. It will not be easy and it cannot be by force. I think I do not need to list all the agencies created by our government to patch over the pitfalls caused by the Great Depression. I wonder how different it would have been if the church had stepped in and rolled up their sleeves and took care of business?
I think addressing the personal loss and pain as the primary factor in this discussion. The church has dropped the ball. Where was the “church” when this man’s family was going through crisis…we are not directly told–were they absent…did they re-direct them to other sources of solace and comfort to provide for their deep needs. (I realize that this is speculation for there is no information to go on here-I am left to my assumptions here)
I ask…where is the Church? Where are we? If we, the church, were really doing our job, the issue of healthcare reform would be a non-issue. We would rally our ministers and pray and do whatever it took to comfort, solace, save, and win.
By: Robert Leever on September 3, 2009
at 7:01 pm