My goodness Clete, you sure covered a lot of ground in 4 scant paragraphs. I'll sort through them as best can. You begin and end your offering with the notion that "democracy", in and of itself, lay at the root of our inability to self govern. You then get, in my estimation, much closer to the truth when you point out man as the weakness that results in the failure of this form of self government. I would take it a step further and point to 1 Sam 8. Being ruled over by the Lord was not sufficient and so began the experiment in self governance by God's chosen people. It's been down hill ever since and I think there is a lesson to be learned there.
Having a king over Israel was always the plan. Israel's error wasn't in wanting a king, it was in not being patient enough to wait on God's timing.
That, of course can be established but it seems a bit much for this post.
You then suggest that man (and woman) are inherently evil. I disagree.
Your disagreement is irrelevant. It isn't a matter of opinion. Anyone descended from Adam who is still in this mortal flesh is evil by nature and whether that were the case or not (which it is) we have not been given the authority to make law but only to enforce it.
I would suggest that we are capable of both good and evil and across the course of a lifetime we learn to eschew the latter and embrace the former. That is the point and purpose of this life for those of us who are not "tares."
No sir. On the contrary. We are born innocent and that is the pinnacle of human righteousness outside of being hidden in Christ, who Himself was and remains a human.
I agree that people are capable of doing good things. I'm no Calvinist and reject entirely their teaching of total depravity but human beings, on the whole and as a group, are evil. Individual actions by specific persons have the greatest variation and therefore the greatest potential for being more good than evil but the larger the group, the less true that becomes. The masses will always gravitate toward collectivism and tyranny. There is clearly a range that groups of people tend to move through where a particular society starts off fairly well, especially if that group has repented and turned toward God, and then they deteriorate until they either implode on themselves or are destroyed by an enemy. This is not only true of nation but of any large organization. Ivy League colleges were all started by Christians and were overtly Christian schools at one time. And just as those schools have deteriorated morally over time, we as a nation are much closer to the end of the process than the beginning.
You then go on to lay the blame for our march toward "collectivism" at the feet of women being given the right to vote. While I would agree that they are "the weaker vessel" we are charged with their care and at some point we are going to have to quit playing Adam and blaming them for our own shortcomings. After all it was men that passed the 19th amendment and likely a preponderance of them were Freemasons.
I thought I was pretty clear that it wasn't the fact that they're women that was the problem. While women do tend to lean left, that isn't what accelerated this country's move in that direction. If it had been reversed and it had been only women that voted and then the men were given the right to vote, the result would have been similar. It is the increase in the size of the committee that creates the problem. Human beings are, on average, evil creatures and the more of them that have a say in what should be considered right and wrong, the faster your society will move toward collectivism (i.e. socialism, communism or whatever).
... and then there is this; ." People (both male and female) are evil, and once you get past a handful of trusted advisors, the more people involved in making a decision, the more likely that decision will be evil."
The Bible says this:
Prov 15: 22Without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counsellors they are established.
Yes, the passage is the specific reason I included the phrase "once you get passed a handful of advisors". An individual who is responsible for making decisions is wise to seek advice from others before he makes his decision. The key point being that it is still his decision and not the decision of a committee where he is the one who not only makes the decision but is held responsible for it.
You then go on to argue for an Old Testament justice system as if Jesus never showed up and said what He said. I know "an eye for an eye" sounds fair but it leaves us all blind eventually.
So you actually do believe that God is unjust and that Mahatma Gandhi and Paul McCartney are/were wiser than God?
Jesus did not suspend the law, nor did He change a single jot nor tittle of it. An eye for an eye is justice, so says the God that created you and Who is the very fountainhead of Justice itself. His character is what gives the concept of justice its very meaning.
Criminal justice, by the way, is quite simple. It is basically, the inverse of the Golden Rule forceably applied to the criminal by the governing official.
Jesus taught us "Do unto others as you you have them do unto you." Criminal justice is when it is done to the criminal as he did (or sought to do) to his victim. Thus, an eye for an eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, life for life. If someone steals $1000 then he should be forced to pay the victim $2000. That way the victim is not only made whole but it is done to the criminal as he did to his victim. If he is unable to pay then he should be forced to work for the victim until his debt is paid (up to a maximum of seven years). This is God's system and it is THE ONLY system endorsed by scripture.
Incidentally, several laws in the Old Testament were religious in nature and had to do not only with religious rituals but with keeping Israel separated from other nations, which was necessary for bringing forth the Messiah in accordance with prophecy. These laws were not moral in nature and have no application outside of the context of Israel and that only from within that nation's covenant relationship with God, which is currently in abeyance.
... and then there is this: "All of which has as much to do with Freemasonry as it has to do with the Lions Club and the Boy Scouts, which is exactly nothing at all."
That's funny in that both are the progeny of the Lodge.
Oh, of course they are! What isn't?! Was the Moose Lodge started by the Masons too? How about Checkers? That's a bar across the street from the Moose Lodge in Tulsa OK (or at least it used to be, I don't know if its still there, which is beside the point.)
Interesting, by the way, that the organizational structure of those organizations, never mind that of the United States of America, bear no resemblance at all of the organization that supposedly spawned them all.
As your posts unfurl I am beginning to suspect that your claim of not being a Mason might be suspect, or, to paraphrase the words of another famous Freemason, "Me thinks thou doth protest too much."
I am not, nor have I ever been a Mason. The extent to which I am familiar with the Masons is the extent to which my step-father, his father and his best friend as well as my uncle were all not only Masons but were in the Scottish Rite and Shriners. My step-brother and I never expressed any interest in joining and none of them asked us to do so, but when that many members of your family are so involved, you can't help but pick a few things up. Plus, there's nothing I've said here that can't be found on the internet in about 60 seconds.
