Rape is one of the worst things that a person can do to someone.
As I consider the allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, there’s something that bothers me. The narrative has been spun as if a person doesn’t care about sexual assault or doesn’t care about women if they want evidence a crime actually happened.
The penalties for these crimes are sickeningly lenient. It’s a major societal problem.
But there still needs to be evidence. (more…)
I spent a few hours watching testimonies from Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford. Many will have conclusions that align with what they believed going into today’s hearing.
It was a lot of political grandstanding. The vote is still tomorrow. Half the country will be happy that Kavanaugh made it through. Half the country will be disgusted. And Saturday will be a new day to debate and argue and tear ourselves apart politically.
I don’t know what really did or didn’t happen. It doesn’t bother me to acknowledge that. I wasn’t there. I don’t personally know these people. I think some people make the mistakes of inherently dismissing the allegations. I think others make the mistake of taking the allegations as if they’re absolute facts.
I don’t know. I think we get so committed to wanting to be right that we don’t care about the truth. Truth is inherently good and worth knowing. And the goal of justice should always be to do the absolute best we can to evaluate things based on truth. Because these are real people who have real families and lives.
I do think that one of the great strengths of our criminal justice system is that people are innocent until proven guilty (I realize the hearing was not a criminal trial). I do think there needed to be some proof of the allegations before potentially destroying a man.
In the Bible, God is a God of truth. The world spreads a lot of lies and often finds reasons to put an agenda ahead of truth. We often look for confirmation rather than reality.
Jesus came full of grace and truth (John 1:17). The Word of God is truth (John 17:17). Jesus is called THE truth (John 14:6).
Truth is true regardless of if we want it to be. Truth is true regardless of if it’s hard. Truth is true regardless of if we don’t want it to be. For the sake of our society, truth needs to be a virtue that we never stop pursuing.
For all of us, I think that’s important to keep in mind. Not just in this case, but whenever we have an opinion, think critically, have a disagreement. Our love of truth needs to matter more than a desire to “win.”
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Josh Benner is the associate pastor at Cornerstone Evangelical Free Church in Fergus Falls, Minnesota and has a Master of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He enjoys writing about faith and culture. He lives with his wife Kari in Minnesota.
The past week has been a circus with allegations of past sexual abuse levied against Supreme Corut nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
I don’t know what this man has or hasn’t done.
I do believe people are fundamentally innocent until proven guilty and that there needs to be evidence.
Some of the moves that the democrats in congress have taken in this process do make it seem like a bunch of political posturing (for instance, them sitting on Dr. Ford’s allegations for weeks and not revealing them until right before a vote. Was that out of their sincere concern for Dr. Ford and desire for her to be heard? Seems like they were very deliberate with that timing).
The whole situation is immensely complicated. (more…)
Few people can say that they’ve had a case go to the Supreme Court. Jack Phillips can. He’s the Colorado baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same sex couple in 2012. The couple took this to the Colorado Civil Rights Commission who ruled in favor of the couple.
According to the Supreme Court, the case addressed whether Colorado’s public accommodations law “violates the First Amendment as applied to an individual who declines to design and create custom wedding cakes for same-sex wedding celebrations that violate his sincerely held religious beliefs.”
In a 7-2 ruling, the court ruled in favor of Phillips. (more…)
Life is bigger than politics.
This weekend, Fox News pundit Tomi Lahren (a woman who’s generally conservative-libertarian but who happens to be pro choice) argued that abortion isn’t a battle worth fighting.
In her argument, Lahren says that conservatives lose on social issues. I think this is part of the failure of her argument. The life of an unborn baby is not a “social issue.” It’s a fundamental right that the child has.
She argues that a challenge on Roe vs Wade is unlikely to succeed. That might be true. But does that mean it’s not worth trying?
I don’t think Lahren gets it because she’s. not. pro. life. She’s pro choice and she’s also looking at the issue from a political perspective, what’s expedient, what’ll help get votes.
The argument I find most troubling is that Lahren argues that “it’s not the government’s place to dictate.” It’s not the government’s place to dictate? The government necessarily has to dictate some things with this issue. For instance, for Miss Lahren, at what point is an abortion no longer justified? And who decides that?
If she feels like it’s not the government’s role, wouldn’t a better answer be to leave it up to the states? It’s not like a reversal of Roe would make abortion illegal or dictate to everyone what they can or cannot do.
But I return to my point that the lives of the unborn are worth fighting for. Political popularity doesn’t dictate what’s moral.
Josh Benner is the associate pastor at Cornerstone Evangelical Free Church in Fergus Falls, Minnesota and has a Master of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He enjoys writing about faith and culture. He lives with his wife Kari in Minnesota.
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