Hier Stehe Ich

           There was a stir in the town of Wittenburg about five-hundred and two years ago. That idiot, selfish monk had dared to argue with the popular beliefs of the day. He nailed 95 arguments to the local bulletin board a.k.a. the church doors, and actually expected to have logical conversations with educated people.
 
            The educated people knew better. What right did Luther have to tell people they couldn't save themselves? What made that impudent monk consider the fact that indulgences couldn't redeem, nor the pope forgive?

         Oh yes, my friends. This monk's beliefs were very unpopular. In the following years he would be excommunicated, shunned, betrayed, kidnapped by friends(long story), hounded all over Germany, and watch people throw his books into the fire.
      
            At the Diet, or Council of Worms where Luther was asked if he would recant his bigoted and intolerant beliefs, he responded with a now well-known statement:

     "Since your most serene majesty and your high mightinesses require of me a simple, clear and direct answer, I will give one, and it is this: I cannot submit my faith either to the pope or to the council, because it is as clear as noonday that they have fallen into error and even into glaring inconsistency with themselves. If, then, I am not convinced by proof from Holy Scripture, or by cogent reasons, if I am not satisfied by the very text I have cited, and if my judgment is not in this way brought into subjection to God’s word, I neither can nor will retract anything; for it cannot be either safe or honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me! Amen."

         Note those last lines, "It cannot be either safe nor honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience." 

     What a notion, my friends, how could he think such a thing, didn't he know that God is love, that being a Christian is all about showing others how much you support them, even if they're heading to hell? Didn't he realize that tolerance, not honesty is what this world needs?


        (If you don't realize I'm being heartily sarcastic by now, you don't know me well enough, but I'm putting this in because, I know some people who might think I'm being serious. Alas, sarcasm doesn't convey well over text!)

       Seriously, good readers, I have realized that we have the kind of world we have today because men like Luther were willing to draw their lines in the sand and say, "Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God."

         Today, I wish to publicly declare my line, and stand there along with Luther, Calvin, Knox, Tyndale, Riddely, Latimer, Hus, Galileo, Wilberforce, Paul, Lady Jane Grey, and a host of others to declare that I cannot go along with the world, and I cannot twist my beliefs to fit with the zeitgeist of this age. 

          This issue I wish to declare is that regarding murder. If I could nail a document to the local bulletin board with 95 arguments against the popular evangelical church, the first one would be with regards to the sanctity of life regardless of how small it is and within whose womb it rests.

             What grieves me is how many people claiming to be Christians pussyfoot around this issue, unable to offend anyone, unable to speak an opinion that might be unpopular or taken badly.

          I little under a week ago, I spoke with five people running for public office in Rolesville. Of the five, though I believe all were against abortion, only one was willing to out and say it, two would not give me an answer. Two told me that it was not their place to judge and that they should not let their personal opinions get in the way of loving people and showing them God's love.

          I was frightened, to be honest. It was the first time in my life somebody said something that made me feel almost like throwing up. I guess in the case of a mother who has decided logically and unemotionally that her one-week-old is unplanned, inconvenient and hazardous to her health, these people would just stand by with tears in her eyes and tell her they support her, that God loves her, and that it's not their place to judge while a doctor gave her baby a sedative, ripped it limb from limb and either tossed it in the garbage or sent it away to a science lab for scrutiny regarding cures for life-threatening diseases.

            My friends, we can too easily get caught up in semantics when it comes down to this. A baby is no less alive in the womb, and abortion is murder. Argue what you will about rape, health hazards, or quality of life for the child. It is murder, and I refuse to call it anything else not treat it any less seriously than the life of that one-week-old, or two-year-old, or teenager, or elderly individual. 

               Here I stand, I can do no other. God help me.


 ~ Christianna