Catoosa Vision

Chattanooga Street Preachers

This is entertaining. Go read the blog posting by Herman Wang at the Times Free Press... the posting about street preachers going biblical on the City Council the other night...

Here's the direct link.

The funniest part is where (and I'll have to take Herman's summary of the meeting, as I wasn't there) the street preacher apparently rails on the City Council for not letting him/them "preach" near the Aquarium. Now, the City Council claims that the preachers are actually "shouting at passersby and holding graphic posters of aborted fetuses."

Here's the funny part... the street preacher then says, "If someone doesn't like the freedom we have, maybe they should move to France, a godless nation."

Whoa! So let's see how the logic might go... god gave us natural freedoms... like freedom of expression, freedom of assembly... Wait! We wrote those...

Let's try again... In America, we recognize various freedoms in our society, such as freedom of expression (ahh... now we're cookin'!)... and if someone wants to take away those freedoms -- our Constitutional rights -- then they should just go to some other country where...... they don't believe in god...

No wait! That doesn't work...

So, what's wrong in France? They certainly have enough freedom to express themselves when they don't agree with our opinions. And last I heard, they weren't being attacked because of their religious or political beliefs. Maybe tolerance and neutrality are good things... especially tolerance. Seems like we've (in this country) in many ways just as intolerant of those who "don't think like us" as we accuse them of being.

Maybe the problem we have is not that we do or don't recognize Constitutional rights... but rather, the problem may be that some people (or entities) run around the country (and now the world) "banging our Bibles" in the face of those who would rather not be preached to.

The way I interpret our Constitutional rights (to religion, expression, assembly, etc.) is that we all certainly can believe what we want... Where I draw the line is having unwanted, unsolicited views forced upon me in offensive, aggressive ways.

For many who want to "spread their faith," I often wonder, what's the objective: Convert or die?

posted by Chris Casey @ 2:40 PM