Monday, January 09, 2012

Defending our Christian heritage in parliament

A conservative MP stands up in NZ Parliament to defend the Judaeo-Christian tradition as the basis of western society, politics and culture. It's not often you hear a parliamentarian retell the gospel narrative in order to ground an ethic of universal love which is then applied to social policy and sharing, economics and ecology. It's a stirring speech outlining the priority of justice over growth and the unconditionality of compassion.

Who is this conservative defender of the faith? Atheist and Green Party co-leader Russel Norman.
H/t Viv Benjamin.

4 comments:

Andrew said...

Thanks for posting this Byron.

Anonymous said...

I would suggest that the inevitable dead end of our Christian heritage, with its drive to gain total power and control over everyone and everything is pictured in these two stark images.

www.dartmouth.edu/~spanmod/mural/panel13.html

www.dartmouth.edu/~spanmod/mural/panel14.html

Plus the inevitable dead end of the "culture" of death as per the above 2 images was portrayed in dramatic terms in the recent Avatar film.

Having already "created" a dying world (just like we have), the obviously godless techno-barbarian invaders were compelled by the inexorable logic/momentum of their "culture" of death to invade conquer and plunder virgin territories, and to terminate all of those who resisted (just like we always have). Such is pictured in the first stark image above.

What was interesting about the film was the response to it by those on the right side of the culture wars, especially by those who presume to be religious - they almost universally loathed the film and came out cheering for the techno-barbarian invaders and their "culture" of death.

byron smith said...

Anon - You assume that Christian heritage = "drive to gain total power and control over everyone". Did you watch the video?

byron smith said...

PS I don't deny that the drive to technological universal mastery is ultimately a delusional and self-destructive one, just that such a drive can in any straightforward way be equated with Christianity. (See for instance this quote.)