Our government is moving towards a corrupted democracy and the deprivation of the rights of the large majority because of factionalism and greed. The frameworks of Republican – Democrat, conservative – liberal, capitalism – socialism, haves – have-nots no longer work. Today’s Christian Heretics? by Ed Houry, available on Amazon, provides a new paradigm to reverse these trends, and sets forth the needed refocus of Christianity to accomplish it. Ed Houry, an engineer, lawyer, and judge retired from the highest non-political levels of government and witnessed the usurpation of federal agency operations and processes to benefit undue influences.
Large corporations, businesses, and wealthy individuals are essential for the creation of jobs and the promotion of commerce. Nevertheless, our democracy is increasingly dominated by a wealthy cabal exercising undue influence through lobby groups, foundations, non-profits, and anonymous entities that manipulate our captive politicians to the detriment of the large majority. In serving the undue influence many of our politicians have exacerbated the concentration of wealth, neglected the environment and climate change, and accelerated the drift towards a corrupted democracy in exchange for re-election support, opportunities for enrichment, and comfortable landings for themselves, families and friends.
Though largely unrecognized, the Christianity practiced today is the Nicene form of Christianity developed and imposed by the church in Rome under the auspices of the Roman Empire centuries after Jesus’ ministry. The Reformation further emphasized beliefs over works. Jesus’ ministry did not include promoting Himself as Lord and Savior. Rather, Jesus emphasized the universal, humanistic values of loving our neighbors as ourselves, living by the golden rule, being magnanimous to those who ask of us, caring for the poor, the afflicted, the imprisoned by giving time, effort and love with self-sacrifice, not simply from our abundance, to those from whom no love, return or remuneration is sought, quietly and without notoriety. Jesus instructed that “not everyone who says to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” Who is doing the will of the Father in today’s world?
The corruption of our democracy, and the Christianity preached in today’s churches are related. “Today’s Christian Heretics?” shows how. Is there too much undue influence in politics and government? Is the Food Safety and Inspection Service protecting our food supply, or the profits of the industries it regulates? Why do we pay twice as much annually for health care, but rank 31st in the world in life expectancy? Why does the U.S. with 4.4 percent of the world’s population have 25 percent of the Covid-19 cases? Is the Federalist Society’s influence on the Supreme Court undermining our democracy? Why aren’t the national debt and the likely insolvencies of Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid when our children and grandchildren need them on our politicians’ agendas? Who is doing the will of the Father in today’s world? Read Today’s Christian Heretics?
###
