by K
On his radio show last week, Glenn Beck said the following:
“I’m begging you, your right to religion and freedom to exercise religion and read all of the passages of the Bible as you want to read them and as your church wants to preach them . . . are going to come under the ropes in the next year. If it lasts that long it will be the next year. I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”
He later claimed that the phrase “social justice” was a “code word” for communism and Nazism.
The audio can be listened to here.
Of course, social justice is an important part of many churches throughout America, most prominently in the Catholic church and in Judaism. The phrase can be found in the catechism, and on the website for the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism.
This equates to Beck “begging” all Catholics, Jews, and many Christians to convert to a different religion–while simultaneously warning people that their right to freely exercise their religion is coming under attack by the government!
Now, do I believe Beck intentionally meant to condemn the entire Catholic religion, Judaism, and most Christians? No. There’s no way Beck would knowingly risk alienating himself from the evangelical right this way. The only conclusion I can draw from this is that Beck simply didn’t know that these religions are all committed to social justice. This makes him deeply and dangerously ignorant, and in no position to be doing the job he performs.
Still, to intrude so rudely into someone else’s personal and private business by telling them to leave their church–on national radio!–is an extremely hateful, bigoted, and anti-American thing to do. I would never call into his show and tell him to leave the Mormon church, even though I disagree with many of its teachings. The fact that he frames this as a warning against some vague notion that the government is coming to violate our religious freedom makes this even more disgusting, as well as extremely ironic.
Religious leaders now have no choice but to condemn Beck for his words. He will probably lose even more advertisers than he already has. Perhaps even some of his loyal listeners will be forced to take another look at the man’s positions. But I won’t hold my breath. Too many times I have heard Beck (and others of his ilk) say something so crazy, inaccurate and morally bankrupt that I believed his fans had no choice but to admit he was wrong. Yet instead I saw them leap to his defense, going through amazing mental gymnastics in search of justifications for his behavior. I can only hope this time will be different, and that religious and other decent people will finally say to Beck, “enough is enough.” But my faith in his fans to do so is not great.