Words - - - Liberal Humanism

Words are tools. Sometimes they are used, and sometimes they are misused. And when they are misused they can do terrible damage to minds and spirits.

As an example, take the word “liberal”. One candidate tried to smear his opponent’s character by calling him a liberal. It is an epithet supposed to convey an aura of incompetence. Actually, any name-calling is a device to hide the speaker’s own inadequacies.

Look at the word “liberal”. Here is the dictionary definition (Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary): (1) not narrow or bigoted – broadminded; (2) republican or democratic forms of government as distinguished from monarchies or autocracies; (3) favoring reform or progress as in religion or education – especially favoring political reforms tending toward democracy and freedom for the individual.

The reference to religion, in the definition, brings the Biblical record to mind. The Bible is a dangerous book. It is a source book for liberal attitudes. Most Western liberal movements have been started with Biblical inspiration. (More about this on later occasions.) It is no wonder that autocratic governments, from time immemorial, have tried to keep it a closed book. Liberalism is a natural outgrowth of Christian faith.

The Bible is a history of liberal reformers – Moses, Elijah, Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Jesus himself – trying to purify the religious culture of their day in spite of persecution by the traditionalists.

If Congressman Hendon is such a person as described in the definition of a liberal, he puts himself in the company of every nation in the Communist bloc. Marxist dogma permits no liberals.

Let’s try another word, “humanist”.

The self-styled “moral majority” has tried to make humanism a dirty word. Humanists are considered to be agents of the devil, to be exercised at all costs.

The dictionary (above) defines humanism as (1) any system or way of thought or action having to do with the interests or ideals of the people; (2) the quality of being human, human nature. ‘Humane’ comes from the same root, defined as “kind, tender, merciful, considerate.” Humanitarianism is another variation.

It puzzles me that supposedly Christian people should oppose humanism. Do they oppose concern for the interest and ideals of people? Do they oppose human behavior – kind, tender, merciful, considerate? Or are they trying to raise a bogey-man to scare more people into contributing more dollars to their TV empires?

The Bible is a humanistic document. It tells of God’s concern for human beings, their achievements and their failures. Probably one of the most quoted verses in the Bible begins, “God so loved the world.” Jesus was a humane humanist with the Samaritan woman at the well, with the woman taken in adultery, with the two outcast tax collectors, Matthew and Zacchaeus, with the lame, the halt and the blind, with the five thousand hungry persons he fed at the lakeside, with the children who came to listen to his parables, and with the thief on the cross.

The more I read the Bible, particularly the gospels, the more I am convinced that Jesus Christ was a God-sent liberal humanist.

All this religion and morality. If you want to interpret it politically, that is your affair.