Only Five Years Apart!
On May 24, Michael Coren came out with an article called Conservatives Don’t Own Jesus. The reason that I’m not addressing this sooner is because Coren long ago blocked me on Twitter so I haven’t been able to follow his work as thoroughly. He’s a pretty big voice in Canada so he cannot be ignored. It seems like only yesterday he was writing Catholic apologetic books but now he’s promoting full blown socialism.
Let me set the record straight. I hate it when people try to take modern post-enlightenment political positions and try to anachronistically shoehorn these labels onto Jesus. No one does this with any other figure from that time. No one does this with Julius Caesar, Cicero, Tiberius, Flavius Josephus or anyone else from that time. But hey, if the Son of God endorses my 21st century political position, then every other Christian who doesn’t endorse my political position is a hypocrite! Haha, take that!
Coren tries to point out how most white religious Americans voted for Trump. So what? Was it because of religion? Trump didn’t run an overly religious campaign. Also, maybe these votes were strategic as people were simply tired of Obama who essentially followed the same foreign policy as George Bush. Ever thought of that Michael? It’s rare that a party in America wins three Presidential elections in a row. Sorry Michael, but voting for someone doesn’t mean that you endorse every sin they’ve ever committed.
He actually starts off the article with the words: Donald Trump is an adulterer, a liar, and a bully. He is divisive and dangerous and an appalling role model for those around him.
I wonder if Michael Coren applies this same standard King Henry VIII. Remember, this isn’t just a politician, it’s the founder of Anglicanism; the new religion of Michael Coren. Don’t worry, I don’t expect an answer from Coren on this one since I’ve long ago stopped expecting consistency from him on religious or political issues.
Coren then goes on to try and justify his leftist positions with the actions of Jesus. We get a lot of the same nonsense that he’s been spouting these last couple years. Jesus never talked about popular right wing social issues, etc. At one point in the article, Coren says:
When a wealthy young man asks what he must do to obtain eternal life, Jesus’s reply is simple: sell everything you have and give the money to the poor. This is socialism—pristine, exquisite socialism.
No Michael, this isn’t socialism. Socialism is when the government takes your hard earned money and gives it to others without your consent. No government is involved in this dialogue. It’s pretty sad that a self proclaimed socialist like Coren doesn’t even know what socialism is.
Then there is the old canard: On the issues of abortion and homosexuality, for example, Jesus hardly says a word.
While Jesus Christ doesn’t say a word about homosexuality, He tells us exactly what a marriage is in Matthew 19 and Coren is quite correct, not a word about homosexuality. While abortion isn’t directly addressed in the Bible, one of the first and possibly even the first documents to be written after the NT condemns it.
But the second commandment of the teaching is this: “Thou shalt do no murder; thou shalt not commit adultery”; thou shalt not commit sodomy; thou shalt not commit fornication; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not use magic; thou shalt not use philtres; thou shalt not procure abortion, nor commit infanticide; “thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods”;
– Didache 2,2
Coren goes on to repeat more thoroughly refuted revisionism to support his positions on abortion, sodomy, divorce and contraception. He brings up that tired ridiculous quote from the very non-reflective nun Joan Chittister where she says:
I do not believe that just because you’re opposed to abortion, that that makes you pro-life. In fact, I think in many cases, your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. And why would I think that you don’t? Because you don’t want any tax money to go there. That’s not pro-life. That’s pro-birth. We need a much broader conversation on what the morality of pro-life is.
This is probably one of the most ludicrous comments that I have ever read. Basically it says if you don’t support tax money going toward something then you don’t support it. I wonder if the author of the Didache who condemned abortion was thinking the same thing.
Coren talks about how the centurion and his slave may have been in a homosexual relationship. Like every other revisionist argument in support of sodomy, this argument has been completely shredded. James White has a great video on it below:
At the end of the day, Coren is engaging in the same thing he accuses conservatives of doing, which is trying to alter the teachings of Jesus to conform to his (very recently adopted) political positions.
As a Catholic, on this blog I have criticized both sides of the political spectrum. I have criticized leftists like Coren, and Fr. James Martin but also people on the right like Lauren Southern and Faith Goldy. I don’t try to twist the words of Jesus to fit my views. I derive my political views from the teachings of Jesus Christ and His Church, like every Christian should be doing.
Jesus wasn’t right wing, left wing, capitalist, socialist, liberal or conservative. These are modern concepts and it is completely inappropriate to try to say that a Galilean preacher from the first century fits into one of these categories. He simply doesn’t and until Michael Coren repents of his horrific anti-Christian views, he’ll never realize that.
Here is his article.
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