OPINION:
The left has a God problem. It spends an inordinate amount of time attacking the God of the Bible and excoriating Christians.
On Good Friday and Erev Passover, The New York Times (the left’s Ministry of Propaganda) ran a commentary urging us to “give up God,” because he’s so hateful and murderous, as described in Exodus.
How can we celebrate the God who brought plagues on the Egyptians when Russian President Vladimir Putin is raining missiles on the Ukrainians, the author asked? He sounded like a cross between the village atheist and the village idiot. If there is a connection between the 10 plagues and Russian missiles, what were all of those Ukrainians doing in church on Easter Sunday?
About the same time, Rep. Ilhan Omar, Minnesota Democrat, got hysterical about a video she saw of Christians on a plane singing and clapping to hymns, which she found deeply offensive. You won’t hear about Christians praying on planes in Ms. Omar’s native Somalia — unless it’s praying to escape.
Since the time of Karl Marx, the left has been at war with religion — which the founder of communism called the “opium of the people.” As the Democrats drift further left, they’ve come to embrace this worldview. Gone is the party of Presidents John F. Kennedy and Franklin Roosevelt, who prayed on the eve of D-Day: “Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.”
Today, the media would call him a Bible-banger.
What is it about traditional religion that drives the left nuts?
1. It doesn’t like hard and fast rules — you know, the commandments thing. Worse, these commandments are often at odds with its causes, including the transgender issue (“Male and female he created them.”) and same-sex relations. Recently on “The View,” Joy Behar said she didn’t think the Bible mentions homosexuality. She probably also doesn’t think the Declaration of Independence has anything to say about natural rights.
2. It hates America. It believes our history can be reduced to a squalid chronicle of the murder of American Indians, slavery, sweatshops and imperialism. So-called progressives understand enough history to know that this nation was founded by Christians, including the Pilgrims, Puritans, Quakers and Catholics. If America is evil, then Christianity must be too.
3. Religion makes Republicans. According to Pew Research, in the 2020 election, among all voters who attend religious services monthly or more often, 59% voted for former President Donald Trump. But President Biden got 71% of the vote of the unaffiliated. It’s in the interest of the Democratic Party to discourage religious practice. That’s why at the height of the COVID-19 panic, then-New York Mayor Bill De Blasio put impossible restrictions on houses of worship, far exceeding those required for other indoor spaces.
4. It believes religion leads to war, exploitation and mass murder, Still, in the 20th century, more people were killed in the name of secularisms than in all of the religious wars in history — from Stalin’s purges to Mao’s Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, to Nazism’s death camps and Pol Pot’s killing fields.
Like any other ideal, religion can be corrupted. Yet under religion, art and science flourished. Monks kept learning alive during the Dark Ages. Besides cathedrals, believers built hospitals and endowed universities. Harvard started as a seminary for Puritan clergy. Both Judaism and Christianity inspired a passion for helping the poor and curing the sick. The masterpieces that characterized the Renaissance started as religious art that adorned altars.
5. Religion is anti-science — oh, you mean like global warming and over-population, part of the left’s catechism? Scientists from Lavoisier to Einstein were either normative Christians or inspired by the vision of a force in the universe beyond the reckoning of man. Einstein saw the workings of God in nature. “There are two ways to live your life,” Einstein said. “One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
Leftists’ war on God says less about him than it does about them. They are driven by a lust for control and a belief that mankind is infinitely malleable, as long as enough force is applied.
Their real problem with God? They want his job.
• Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer and syndicated columnist.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.