Recently in Justice Wednesday Category

(Crossposted on Pam's House Blend)

A friend of mine changed his Facebook status to "...lost his fundamental civil rights today."

This got me thinking: Can we lose our fundamental civil rights?

I thought about the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

 Please note that the founders did not say the government created these rights, only secured the rights people already had.

There is also the ninth amendment to the US Constitution:

Amendment 9 - Construction of Constitution. Ratified 12/15/1791. The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

So can a law or constitutional amendment remove a person's rights?

I don't even think there is an L community, a G community, a B community, or a T community. There are too many layers of class and empowerment in each group to consider any one of them a community.

There are homeless gay youth who turn tricks to survive. There are rich closeted men who pay them. Are they part of the same community?

There are "heterosexual crossdressers only" organizations. There are people taking black market hormones and getting silicone injections. Are they part of the same community?

I find it hard to believe in community when I read about, and hear, comments like:

• (by a gay man about transsexuals)Men in women's bathrooms.
• (by lesbians about mtf transsexuals)A man in a dress is not a lesbian.
• (by gay men)Women are taking over the HIV/AIDS organizations.
• (by crossdressers)I'm not confused like a transsexual.
• (about crossdressers) I'm not a man in a dress.
• (by heterosexual crossdressers)No homosexuals allowed

not to mention the unspoken contempt between the classes.

While we're saying "were the same as everyone else", we betray our real feelings by declaring ourselves different from each other.

It's not bad enough that there are a bunch of us locked outside the big tent that calls itself "normal". We have to divide ourselves up into smaller camps of "more normal than thou". And, by exploiting our divisions, those who control access to the big tent will continue to keep us out.

There have been reports of child molestation by church leaders. Firearm discharge inside churches seems to be on the rise.

With these and other recent events, any organization would do well to examine their security policies. Yet for churches, we might well consider the theological basis of our choices.

For Christians, there is the example of the one who walked with lepers, the lame, adulterers, prostitutes, people with boils, the demon possessed, women with chronic bleeding, and tax collectors. Yet we also have a duty to protect those who are vulnerable.

How do we live grace and faith in God's protection, while caring for those around us?

I sometimes wonder whether I have early-onset Alzheimer's disease. I forget a lot of things, and I seem to remember things that never happened, or were never the way I remember them.

This might be one of them.

I seem to remember a time when places of worship were held sacred, even by people outside the faith. I seem to remember a time when people respected these places even when those people did not believe at all.

Candidate and ordained minister the Reverend Michael Dale "Mike" Huckabee find support for capital punishment in the death of Jesus:

Interestingly enough, if there was ever an occasion for someone to have argued against the death penalty, I think Jesus could have done so on the cross and said, "This is an unjust punishment and I deserve clemency."

After all, if Jesus wasn't OK with it, he might have prayed "My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want." Oh, yeah, he did - as documented in Matthew 39, Mark 14:36-39, and Luke 22:42-44.

Well, why didn't he say something about his unjust treatment on the cross, like "you guys are wrong" or, knowing his gracious nature, "Father, forgive them." Oh, yeah, he did - as documented in Luke 23:34.

Yet if we are going to use the death of Jesus, who by tradition and faith was innocent and blameless, as justification for capital punishment, it is only a minor step to say that it justifies the execution of the innocent.


That's the problem with using past violence to justify violence in the present - it assumes we cannot learn a better way. The rule of "an eye for an eye" was meant as a limit - that one could not extract more in vengeance than the initial harm. Yet even "eye for an eye" leads to the eternal violence of retaliation.


There is a better way - the way of deescalation, of relaxing the tensions, of mending relationships. That does not mean we should let murderers go free - but it means that revenge does not offer anything more than temporary satiation of our own blood lust.


I cannot make my enemy stop hating me by killing his loved ones.

References:
http://www.motherjones.com/washington_dispatch/2007/12/huckabee-faith-baptist-pastor-sermons.html

The City of Chicago has awarded $14 million to a man who accused two Chicago Police Department officers of  doing a "cavity search" using a screwdriver, causing internal injuries. While the officers claimed innocence, they could not explain the presence of screwdrivers in the glovebox of the police car, not the presence of fecal matter in the glovebox.

Meanwhile, a New Jersey woman was followed by a car registered to a company that doesn't exist. The Postmaster of the town in which the car is registered cannot comment because "it's a sensitive matter".

Are these our public servants?

It's certainly not the way I understand service.

While the disciples argued over who would be the greatest, or requested the favor of sitting at the left and right hands of Jesus, Jesus told his followers that the greatest would be the least, and the least: greatest. Jesus's own humility in serving the disciples - demonstrating hospitality to his own followers - shows his own ability to be a servant.

True servants do not spy on those they serve. Those who do right do not hide in shadows - or behind post office boxes for companies that don't exist. And true servants are not cruel, and do not seek to debase those they serve - even if such a person is a suspect.

The heart of service is in respect and in love. If we love one another, we will respect each other. Jesus taught his followers to even love their enemies - how much more should we love those of whom we only have suspicion?


References:

• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13705
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13731
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13741
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13767
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13917
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=13999
• http://www.chicagopublicradio.org/Cityroom_Read.aspx?storyID=14060
• http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/ny-nyroc245387882sep24,0,1911059,full.story
• http://www.goodasyou.org/good_as_you/2007/09/is-that-wiretap.html