Unveiling the Light

One might wonder why a priest would have political opinions and care about the political events of our country. Truthfully, I find that I am becoming less interested in politics all the time but I also fear the loss of freedom that is occurring in this country. Freedom of religion is closely tied to the personal freedom we all hold. Our forefathers of this country knew this just as did our forefathers of faith.

The story of Moses is about leading the people of God to freedom so that they could worship their God and live out their faith. They found freedom in God, something the Pharaoh would not tolerate as their God was not his. He thought himself to be a god and wanted them to worship him. The early Church had much the same problem. Roman emperors were considered gods in themselves. Christians were pressured and tortured to make them worship the Roman gods, including the emperor. Many became martyrs for standing up for their freedom to worship only the one true God.

Our forefathers of this country recognized that our rights are God given. In our Declaration of Independence, they did not invent the right to be free. We acknowledged that this right was given us by God. The declaration begins with this truth. “… to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them …. 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.”

We must, therefore, not only live and protect our religious freedoms but must also understand that our ability to do so is directly tied to the freedoms of the country in which we live. Because of this I become alarmed when I hear how these rights are being circumcised. Many point to the activities of government agencies as potential intruders into our freedoms and certainly we must monitor their activities while giving them the ability to protect us from attack. But the true attacks on our freedoms are found in the open and are hidden in political correctness and efforts to “protect us” from hate speech.

The problem with actions against freedom of speech is where to draw the line. Do you draw it before Imus, or before Rush Limbaugh, or perhaps we put Fox News on the wrong side of the line. This is just what House bill HR3305 will do as it will try to reintroduce the “Fairness Doctrine.” The goal of this is clearly to shut down conservative talk radio. Its main sponsor, Representative Maurice Hinchey, referred to conservative talk radio as a threat to national security and declared that, "All of that stuff will end."

Currently it is the free market that controls who speaks on Talk Radio. There are liberal stations, some of which are outright hateful in their speech, but because conservatives are the majority, they have become a target for liberals in Congress. Never mind that TV is predominantly liberal, as are the nation’s newspapers. Talk radio is seen as the danger. Of course, this will only remain true as long as the democrat liberals control the agenda. If a Reaganistic figure comes forth and the tide turns, that same doctrine could be turned against the liberal stations, newspapers and television.

This is the danger of such action. What seems right for us now quickly becomes oppression for others and can turn on its master. Liberals may feel that conservative radio needs to be shut down but how will the conservatives feel? What if they win power and want revenge? The fact is that control of the media is the first action taken by oppressive governments. Control the media and you control what the people know. Control knowledge and you can get away, literally, with murder. Freedom dies for those who do not follow the party line.

Radio talk show host Imus was shut down by his own company due to political pressure, but not government pressure. The rise in outrage certainly had a political component but the government did not force him to resign. His private employer did. With the Freedom of Information Act, the government itself would force such resignations. Some bureaucrat in Washington, bowing to whoever is in power, would decide that a certain program is “against the nation’s interests” and force its closure.

The content of talk radio is controlled today by the will of the people. Those shows that are popular are able to bring in advertisers, make money and grow. Those that are not will lose listeners and thus advertisers and run out of money. The Fairness Doctrine would replace popular opinion with the whim of a bureaucracy. It replaces our freedom of choice with the popular opinion of the day or simply the will of those who hold the right offices at the right time. It fails to have faith in the people to make good decisions from the free flow of information.

We can expect our religious freedom to decrease with our freedom of speech. Already in Canada bishops and preachers are under pressure by a new law that makes illegal any speech deemed to be antigay. Some say this includes biblical references or speaking against same sex marriage. Whatever this is, it is not freedom. It is the imposing of government sanctioned thought on the speech of the people. If we can no longer have an exchange of views and ideas, then we are no longer free.

My faith, the Catholic Church, takes the stand that we have nothing to fear from science and modern thought. We are willing and able to debate the issue and show that human reasoning leads to the acceptance of God. This was the whole point behind the writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas. He took the modern reasoning of the time, led by the newly found works of Aristotle, and used that reasoning to demonstrate the existence and work of God in the world.

Those who support democracy should also be so bold. If we support democracy, we should not try to shut down the opposition but to put our ideas against theirs. If an idea cannot survive in a public debate, then either its time has not come or it was wrong in the first place. Just as the Church has faith that God always prevails, so too a democratic people should have faith that democracy will survive the exchange of ideas. If someone espouses ideas you find offensive, you can turn them off, listen to others, or come up with your own way of communicating what you believe. You don’t shut down those you disagree with.

The Nazi’s controlled their media. So did Stalin and other communists. Totalitarian states always go for the media and communication first. They do not trust a people to be free and so take that freedom away. How sad that the generation of the 60s which demanded free speech for itself is now so ready to go against the ideals they once supported. It is the ultimate of selfishness and self idolization to think that only you hold the right answers or views. Some humility will do us all well. This nation must remain free or religion will go underground, with other “objectors”.

Father Steven Foppiano