“They set their mouths against the heavens, and their tongue struts through the earth.
Therefore his people turn back to them, and find no fault in them.
And they say, ‘How can God know? Is there knowledge in the Most High?’
Behold, these are the wicked.”
(Psalm 73:9-12)

There is a new religion in town, and it rules the roost. In fact, it has been this way for quite a while now; I call it “Secular Elitism.” Believe it or not, this strange religious non-religion now demands worship, allegiance and obedience in every facet of our society. And if you don’t adhere to “S.E.”’s dictates, you will be publicly shamed, scolded and ultimately silenced. This is our new modern day “Inquisition.”

Christianity is partly to blame for this. Or I should say. . . “Bad Christianity” is.

Recently, I was reading a couple of books on the history of Christianity in Western Europe and then its migration to America. As one writer explains, “Sadly, we need to acknowledge the bad chapters in Christian history, especially when talking about the oppressive intolerance that was the norm for much of the 14th to 17th centuries…far from honoring truth and open debate, the orthodoxy of the previous centuries had ‘made truth dangerous’ in the sense that when the power of orthodoxy was coercive, there was no freedom to disbelieve.” The Catholic Church actually, as the same writer said, “claimed a monopoly on thought” and outlawed dissent. They said at the time, “error had no rights.”

To force their truth down the throats of the people, the Inquisition in all of its tortuous forms was implemented and cruelly applied. Independent thinkers and people who didn’t fall in lockstep with church magisterium were put on the rack, property was confiscated, and even whole families were slaughtered. All because they didn’t believe and think as those in control wanted them to.

As the years passed, reasonable people banded together to fight the dereliction of the church. Oppressive intolerance started to be overturned and righted by reason, science, the printing press and proper understanding of the “true teachings” of the scriptures through the influence of the Christian Reformation. A fresh wind of exploration and learning surged through Europe and America, individual thinking exploded, freedom of having new ideas and opinions broke upon the souls of men and women.

As a result of tasting this new freedom, the fear of falling back to the old oppressive ways of thinking subtly caused doubt and cynicism to grow in how people viewed the church and even the truth.

Over time new values began to take root: The Judaeo-Christian God, the majority’s deity, was replaced with an impersonal idea called “Freedom.” But this was a new type of freedom, the paranoid fear of oppressive rule mutated it. No longer is freedom defined as the ability to live rightly, it is now the right to live unhindered. Another word for this is “radical license”; where the lone individual must be allowed to think and do as he wants without submitting to the accepted rules and norms that are generally agreed upon by most reasonable people, and men and women of good-will. This new freedom insists, “People must never be expected to conform, even if it is good for them!”

To stop oppressive intolerance from ever rearing its ugly head again, we now fear the behavior and choices of the non-vocal majority who simply want to be left alone to become the norm.

In turn, the “Law of God & Rules for a Good Society” have been replaced by another impersonal idea we call “tolerance.” While this word may sound innocuous at first; like a fuzzy Tribble on Star Trek, after years of feeding it, tolerance has now grown into a hungry one-eyed monster devouring anyone that doesn’t tolerate it. Tolerance also has been redefined, no longer are we to simply dialogue with different ideas, we must now adopt and embrace every odd idea, inclination, and deviant behavior.

In other words, the pendulum has swung completely to the other side! Where once “there was no freedom to disbelieve”,  there is now “no freedom to believe in truth.” Error now determines rights. You want to be a girl even though you are a boy? More power to you!  And we must now “silence” those who think a boy is still a boy.

As a result, a new die of the old Inquisition has been made. If you try to argue truth in the public square you are laughed at by the “Elite”: this includes Progressive professors, media manipulators, establishment politicians who are now the defenders of the single aberrant, minority voice. And they will not tolerate the ideas of the majority. They say they are protecting the freedom of the individual, but in truth, it is another magisterial power play – – but this time their power is obtained through the back door, “If you vote for me and put me in power, I will fight for you against the majority.”

And boy do they fight! They have no problem shaming a person that stands for something; they will call you judgmental, archaic, and accuse you of being infected with the virus of “intolerant oppression.” Boy does it work. Instead of putting people on the rack, they scold you in the media and social communities, and with the backing of the ignorant masses, the person standing on righteousness derived from God’s truth is excoriated and made a mockery.

By appealing to the false fear that intolerant oppression will once again have its way; the Elite begin to believe they are the only ones standing on the higher moral ground. In their eyes, truth seekers are the reprobates, and they are scolded and shouted down into submission. (ie: Did you hear the President yesterday? If that wasn’t a scolding toward those who have a justified problem with Islamic terrorism, I don’t know what it was?) And then they silence you by joining their power together and in unison claim, “You are an intolerant bigot.”

So now, the man who shot the 50 people isn’t the problem; it is those who say he is the problem that have become the problem. Decay in our society is no longer seen as coming from sick sexual perversions and unhindered greed and cronyism, but from the faith that fosters chastity, humility, marital fidelity and love for God. They are nothing more than the remnants of a dead past, they are now believed to be the fruits of oppressive intolerance.

But you may say, “Hey, at least this new Inquisition doesn’t put you on the rack or confiscate your property!” Oh really? They tax me to pay for the “unhindered freedoms” of others. They blame me for the destruction that was caused by the terrorists. I am shamed, scolded and silenced in our new age of tolerance.

I once had a teacher named Sister Joan of Arc. In her classroom, she was never wrong. We had to submit to her iron-fisted rule; no backtalk and no dissent. One time during chapel, two boys next to me were passing notes to girls and Sister Joan of Arc was furious. She blamed the whole class for this terrible violation of her hypercritical code of behavior – – and would even resort to physical punishment to put us all in our place. She shamed all the boys, she kept us in during recess and scolded us, we couldn’t talk back. I had to hold a book for 5 minutes straight out without letting it fall.  I went home and told my dad about how I thought this was unfair.

He had a meeting with the sister…she couldn’t shout him down. She couldn’t control him like she could a class of inferior 4th-grade students she felt superior to. He put her in her place.

The Elites want God kicked out of society so they can own the classroom. They make everyone submit – – no backtalk, no dissent, they are disappointed at our adherence to truth and healthy tradition. But God is there even if you don’t want to believe he is. Truth still is truth. A boy still is a boy. Islam is still idolatry and there is coming a day when we all will be put in our place.