Definition of ecce homo
: behold the man —from the words of Pontius Pilate when he presented Jesus, crowned with thorns, to the crowd before his crucifixion
Ecce Homo | Definition of Ecce Homo by Merriam-Webster (merriam-webster.com)
This the second part of the following topic in bold below.
Are The Conflicts That Arise Because Of The Differences Between The Christian Worldview And Secular Morality The Cause Of Our National Divide?
What is the subtopic in this post.
The Origins Of The Modern Secular Morality
We cannot visit the past. It is expensive to visit a foreign country. So, most Americans do not appreciate how distinctive our Christian heritage is from the heritage of non-Christian peoples. Because we have little experience with our own pre-Christian ancestors and the brutal practices in other nations, we don’t know the magnitude of the unpleasantness we are missing. Unfortunately, our ignorance is a problem. For the sake of tolerance and so we can allow politicians to run our schools, we allow public school teachers to indoctrinate our children in the supposedly secular ideology of multiculturalism.
Multiculturalism, the view that cultures, races, and ethnicities, particularly those of minority groups, deserve special acknowledgment of their differences within a dominant political culture. (continued)
multiculturalism | Definition, Impact, Challenges, & Facts | Britannica
When we implement this view with respect to education, we make a wreck of our education system. Because we have a finite time to educate our children, we must choose what we want our children to learn. Multiculturalism, because it focuses on teaching so many differing beliefs, interferes with the instruction of children in the beliefs that have the most merit. What ideas have the most merit? With respect to religious and cultural beliefs, is that not something parents should decide?
Government is clearly not qualified. Multiculturalism, the government’s solution, is a demonstrably absurd solution. Because multiculturalism is based upon the demand that all views need to taught, multiculturalism implies that all views have equal value. That proposition cannot logically be true.
If all views have equal merit, then the view that Christians have a better view on Jesus than the Jews have is just as true as the idea that Jews have a better view on Jesus than the Christians do. But this is hopelessly contradictory. If the first statement is what tolerance amounts to, then no one can be tolerant because “tolerance” turns out to be gibberish.
The Intolerance of Tolerance (townhall.com)
There is only one way all theistic beliefs can be equally valid. God does not exist. Therefore, multiculturalism demands an absurd degree of tolerance. If the effort keep our schools secular requires us to allow our government to teach our children to be Atheists, then government cannot run our schools. That sort of Secularism violates the First Amendment, which prohibits our government from establishing a religion.
Consider what should be obvious. Consider the advice of Peter Kreeft’s (of Boston College.) tolerance.
Be egalitarian regarding persons. Be elitist regarding ideas. — Peter Kreeft of Boston College (from here)
Is Christianity the best, most elitist idea? Consider this excerpt from Dr. Everett Piper’s column.
In his excellent article written for The Steam, Jonathan Van Maren summarizes Mr. Holland’s newest book, “Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World,” as follows. “[Holland’s] book … [comes] as something of a surprise for several reasons. First, Tom Holland is not a Christian. Second, [‘Dominion’] is one of the most ambitious historical defenses of Christianity in a very long time.”
Mr. Van Maren continues. “While studying the ancient world, Holland … realized something. Simply, the ancients were cruel, and their values utterly foreign to him. The Spartans routinely murdered ‘imperfect’ children. The bodies of slaves were treated like outlets for the physical pleasure of those with power. Infanticide was common. The poor and the weak had no rights.
America does not need the pallid milquetoast of Biden and complicit RINOs – Washington Times
Several years ago I wrote a series of posts (The last post, WHO IS THIS MAN? by JOHN ORTBERG — PART 7 – Citizen Tom, contains links to the rest.) on John Ortberg’s book, Who Is This Man? Here is how I began the series.
Even those who do not believe he was God must find the life of Jesus of Nazareth incongruous. Yet do they ever wonder? How did a mere man, a man unbelievers say was not God and never did anything, ever become the most famous man in history? Well, the unbelievers are wrong. Jesus did quite a bit, and that is the point of John Ortberg‘s book, Who Is This Man?
In chapter 1, Ortberg begins his book by observing that Jesus did not become famous in any of the usual ways. He was not a conquering general of armies. He was a teacher, but not just a teacher. He was not particularly famous in His lifetime, but He left a church that grew and spread His Gospel.
WHO IS THIS MAN? by JOHN ORTBERG — PART 1 – Citizen Tom
What did Jesus do that so dramatically changed Western civilization and has slowly changed much of the world? Well, Ortberg’s book provides the answer in some detail, and the Bible provides the answer in exquisite detail. Here is an example.
New American Standard Bible
God Is Love
7 Beloved, let’s love one another; for love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 By this the love of God was revealed [a]in us, that God has sent His only Son into the world so that we may live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the [b]propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God remains in us, and His love is perfected in us. 13 By this we know that we remain in Him and He in us, because He has given to us of His Spirit. 14 We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.
15 Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him, and he in God. 16 We have come to know and have believed the love which God has [c]for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. 17 By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, we also are in this world. 18 There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear [d]involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. 19 We love, because He first loved us. 20 If someone says, “I love God,” and yet he hates his brother or sister, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother and sister whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21 And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God must also love his brother and sister.
Anyone who was raised in the United States has to some degree received some portion of the Christian heritage left by the people who founded this nation. Everyone who was raised in the United States, even if they are not a Christian, know that Jesus taught that we should love and care for each other, that all of us have the potential to be a child of God. What Secularists have trouble accepting is this belief.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. –That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
Declaration of Independence (archives.gov)
What do Secularists believe? Secularist believe that government gives us our rights. Instead of rights given to us by God, the One who created and loves us, Secularists believe in reason. Secularists believe that we will elect government officials who will give us our rights because some sort of ill-defined logic requires it. Voters supposedly want a government that maximizes the happiness of the most people. Given the history of Man, there is no reason to believe that will work.
This is part of the fourth installment in this series. What were the first three?
- Introducing The Topic
- Does Secularism Provide A Practical Foundation For A Decent Ethical System?
- Does Christianity Provide A Practical Foundation For A Decent Ethical System?
- Are The Conflicts That Arise Because Of The Differences Between The Christian Worldview And Secular Morality The Cause Of Our National Divide?: In progress.
Where we at in Part 4 of this series?
- How do we form a mature conscience?: Last post, Part 4A
- The origins of the modern Secular morality: This post, Part 4B
- The issue of pride: Next post.
- Do our political divisions match our religious divisions?
Additional References
- Multiculturalism and Conservatives (americanthinker.com)
- Multiculturalism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
- Developing a Multicultural Ideology | The Center for the Study of the Individual and Society (umn.edu)
- Abandoning the Christian Values That Make America Exceptional – The Christian Post
- Was America Founded As A Christian Nation? (forbes.com)
- America’s Christian Tradition Deeply Influences Culture | National Review
- Did America Have a Christian Founding? | The Heritage Foundation
Citizen Tom 
Reblogged this on boudica.us.
Thanks!
Public school teachers do not indoctrinate children in secular ideologies or atheism of any kind, they will educate them in aspects of science that theists do not want them to know anything about simply because the children may want to actually investigate what they are told to believe and make up their own minds about what they want to believe. Indoctrination is the exclusive realm of religions and it is scientific knowledge that threatens Christianity more than anything else and you have acknowledged that fact in your words.
Multiculturalism means the presence of, or support for the presence of, several distinct cultural or ethnic groups within a society.
It is about recognition by the majority and has nothing to do with treating any one group or groups better than another, however it does happen but it is not defined by this actual word.
Teaching children to respect other cultures and races is I would have thought a Christian kind of morality, is it not? Obviously your policy is to keep the children away from every other influence in the world apart from your own religious ideology because you believe it has the most merit. Of course if the parents are Christians like 70% of Americans are they will instruct them or indoctrinate them into Christianity anyway, and many of them would do that regardless of what the schools taught them.
The idea of keeping children in the dark from other religious beliefs scientific facts, social and political ideals etc that make up the world they live in can only be extremely selfish and oppressive. We in the developed western countries fought wars to be free of ideologies and regimes that wanted to invade and suppress us such as communism, this is why we also fight against Muslim extremists. Therefore why would you not let American children have their freedom to learn about the world and its people so they can decide what they want to believe?
@sklyjd
That was the standard secularist response. I think the content of my post already refutes it.
Indoctrination is teaching a doctrine. Secularists teach their doctrine. I did not propose to keep anyone in the dark. In a society composed of multiple cultures, instead of a monolithic secularized culture, that would be next to impossible.
I’m trying to think of how indoctrinated a person would have to be to believe that:
1) They absolutely know the intentions of every (public) school teacher in the nation, and can make a broad sweeping statement like “Teachers do not indoctrinate” with such confidence.
and
2) Have so little knowledge of history, let alone current events.
We’re “studying” the French Revolution now. Basically these types of revolutions do the same things. One of their first moves is to secularize the population and disarm them. In France this was done via loyalty pledges to the State above God. Any monastery that refused lost everything. Wasn’t very popular with the rural towns that relied on them, but heh, the State and mob know best.
Side note: And of course, the university of “#Science!” is always invoked.
I was emergency certified to teach both science and math because so few teachers have either qualification they took someone without a teaching degree, with a hard science degree. I took graduate level courses in biochemistry, immunology, and bacteriology for fun and these are the people who would claim I am ignorant on science.
I assume in the US like in Australia you mostly have dedicated and skilled teachers who do their job very well and not have an evil intent to indoctrinate their class of children into radical socialists or into their own personal ideologies. Of course I may be wrong as all sorts of weird things are happening in your country just lately.
History and the French Revolution, how do you equate this to the the US? Sure I can see that many Christian and possibly many non-Christian people are being indoctrinated and pledging loyalty to Trump like he is a god, however we hope this is not going to turn into a similar French revolutionary blood bath.
The learning of biological evolution, UFOs, the universe, neuroscience, all the worlds religions, all political and social ideals, the history of the wars and the old empires, the world and everything you can think of should not be withheld from education for any child at any time. The more we can teach our children the better off we all will be for the future.
Parents want what is good for their children.
Leaving Christian teachings up to adulthood (and not all children reach adulthood) is little saying one should wait until a child grows to adulthood to teach them manners, how to take care of themselves (diet, exercise and so forth), how to treat others respectfully….because all cultures are different and some value fatties, and manners differ as does value for life.
Good, upstanding adulthood generally requires some foundational guidelines in childhood. See feral children for the outlier example of children raised without any guidelines.
Teaching children manners, respect and how to look after themselves is not the same as indoctrinating them into an adult belief system that may have negative consequences for the adult life of the child. I can understand informing children of how you believe the world should be and why you believe it was created, however they maintain the freedom and the right to also be informed of all the other views without being coerced or forced into any adult ideology.
It is easy to claim schools are teaching secular and atheist ideals when they are simply being taught science and history that encompasses the old and the modern scientific knowledge of the planet built over many centuries. It may not be believed by all, however it cannot be denied and should not be hidden from the future citizens. “Knowledge is power” (Thomas Jefferson)