| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Culture Wars |
| Presbyterian Jihad |
| 2004-07-20 |
| Click on the source for plenty of links Jewish liberals received a shock last week. The liberal Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) declared war on Israel at is annual General Assembly meeting, approving a divestment campaign from Israel with 87 percent of the vote, casting the Holy Land as the new South Africa. The shock was doubly painful since liberal Jews believe that liberal churches are supposed to be their allies in all kinds of common fights. Jewish liberals frequently warn that Christian conservatives are not allies of the Jews and do not share Jewish values. There is a genuine fear by liberal Jews that other Jews might walk off the liberal plantation, and create bonds politically with Christian conservatives as a result of their support for Israel. Some Jews might even vote Republican. (Imagine that!) These criticisms have grown louder as Christian conservatives have become a very strong force supporting Israel in its war with Palestinian terrorism. Liberal Jews have even attacked that support, claiming it is based on Scripture, rather than on any real shared values, hence is not the kind of support Israel supposedly needs. According to this school of thought, liberal Christians who support Israel, presumably would do so for the right reasons, whatever those might be. (Israel's socialist economy? Its imperial judiciary?) Of course, any liberal Jew who had an actual conversation with a Christian conservative supporter of Israel would be surprised to find out that the support for Israel is based on a variety of reasons, and not "just Scripture". It is ironic, of course, that among the "People of the Book," support for Israel based "on Scripture" is used as a metaphorical putdown. But for many Jews, secular humanism and liberalism has become their real religion of choice, whatever lip service they may pay to actual Judaism. The columns of Paul Krugman and Nicholas Kristof have become the modern Talmud. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #2 A liberal church here in Tucson - situated on the town's main drag of Speedway Blvd. - hosts Friday nite demonstrations against "Israeli Occupation". This has been going on for years. These modern day brownshirts carry nary a poster condemning Sudan....mutatis mutandis... |
| Posted by: borgboy 2004-07-20 10:58:06 PM |
| #1 There has been this strain in the PCUSA forever. I went to school with the son of a minister who never met a looney protest he did not like, and was encouraged to do so by his father. At the most recent HS reunion in 2001, he hadn't changed, and I suspect even 9/11 didn't change him. This PCUSA has a gay liberation flag over their church in West Hollywood CA, and not a US flag. Enough said. |
| Posted by: BigEd 2004-07-20 1:05:04 PM |