Ladies and Gentlemen, I write you today to express my profound concern for our nation and for everything cherished by people of faith. “Love of country” as we have known it is in serious jeopardy. Those who are determined to “fundamentally change” America have forged a virulent and growing political movement that recognizes no allegiance to the U.S. Constitution. They think they have a better idea. People like that despise the Declaration of Independence, which proclaims that we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights—among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Indeed, the concept that our freedoms were a gift from the Creator is anathema to these revolutionaries. I am especially concerned about a generation of children who are being manipulated and warped day by day. These vulnerable boys and girls have no defense against activists and some liberal teachers who are propagandizing them. They see our kids as a way to guarantee their vision of a socialist future. Their goal is to recast America as a Marxist, atheistic, all-powerful form of government.
Is such a tragic day coming on this beloved country? Not if we and millions of other patriots can prevent it!
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If you are among them, I hope you will remember these exhortations when you continue to hear the mainstream media promoting socialist revolution in the days ahead. I also urge you to support the voices who are warning against those who want to “fundamentally transform” democracy. What is so wrong with our constitutional form of government that it should be thrown on the ash heap of history? What we are facing here is a culture war that is driven by those who hate Christianity and the Church of Jesus Christ. If the far left is successful in capturing the hearts and minds of Americans, the entire world will descend into a spiritual darkness unlike anything that has ever been seen. Please make that a matter of fervent prayer during these next 14 months [until we get baby Christian Trump re-elected], and do pass this letter on to your friends and pastors.
America’s enemies within use churches, schools, corporate advertising, entertainment, fake news media and social networks to spread lies about Trump and our wonderful country. Trump is pretty much a lone voice in the international arena standing up for America, exposing leftists’ lies.
This is why I wholeheartedly support Trump exposing Democrat congresswomen Ilhan Omar, AOC, Ayanna Pressley and Rashida Tlaib for the anti-American, antisemitic, racist, socialist and communist hate-filled traitors that they truly are.
How on earth did these four haters of America get elected? The answer is fake news media covers for them, falsely portraying them as saintly victims of America’s racial and sexual bigotry. Trump courageously shining the light of truth on them has upset Democrat and fake news medias’ apple-cart.
To make Trump back off, Democrats and fake news media implemented their standard dirty trick that always silences Republicans and Conservatives. Their trick is to spin the slightest push back against leftists’ radical agenda to the ultimate evil hateful extreme. For example: If you stand up for God’s definition of marriage, Democrats and fake news media say you hate homosexuals and want them dead.
Democrats and fake news media insidiously said patriots jovially chanting “send her back” at the Greenville Trump rally really means they wish to do Omar physical harm. Meanwhile, Democrats and fake news media were silent when an angry mob chanted “What do we want! Dead cops! When do we want it? Now!” at a Black Lives Matter rally. Outrageously, leftists even justified Black Lives Matter launching a clarion call to assassinate our brave men and women in blue.
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For years, Democrats and fake news media have used their trick of spinning reasonable pushback to mean the ultimate hateful extreme. When a wacko Muslim gunman massacred homosexuals in an Orlando nightclub, Democrats and fake news media claimed the massacre was the fault of Christians who support traditional marriage. Do you see how their trick works? It is designed to silence all opposition and intimidate everyone into surrendering to leftists’ extreme agenda.
Do you find yourself explaining the same things over and over to people who cannot or will not comprehend or understand your point of view/opinion/worldview? I know I do. Every day, my writing is read by thousands of people, and no matter how often I explain myself, some people — looking at you Evangelicals, Independent Fundamentalist Baptists, Fundamentalist Catholics, Right-wing Christians, Diehard Republicans — have heads filled with cement, leaving them unable to entertain any point of view/opinion/worldview but their own. The more certain people are of their rightness, the harder it is to reach them. Christian Fundamentalists, in particular, are absolutely certain that their peculiar beliefs came straight from God, and their practices are exactly how Jesus and the first-century church practiced New Testament Christianity. Some people are so obtuse that it is nigh impossible to meaningfully engage them intellectually. Talking to them is like beating your head up against a brick wall. You are bloodied and in pain, but you’ve not made a dent in their ignorance. And so today, I officially give up.
I give up trying to explain that I didn’t become an atheist because I was hurt by the church.
I give up trying to explain that I am not bitter over my past.
I give up trying to explain that I am not angry at the Christian God.
I give up trying to explain that I don’t hate the Christian God.
I give up trying to explain that I didn’t leave Christianity because I secretly desire to “sin.”
I give up trying to explain that I am not a worshiper of Satan.
I give up trying to explain I really was a committed follower of Jesus who believed the Bible from cover to cover.
I give up trying to explain that I really did wholeheartedly devote the first fifty years of my life to Jesus.
I give up trying to explain that I devoted most of my adult life to preaching the gospel and evangelizing sinners.
I give up trying to explain that atheism is not a religion.
I give up trying to explain that people can be moral and ethical without God.
I give up trying to explain that all morality is subjective.
I give up trying to explain that Evangelicalism is inherently Fundamentalist.
I give up trying to explain that atheists don’t want to make Christianity illegal.
I give up trying to explain why I blog.
I give up trying to explain why I publish the Black Collar Crime series.
I give up trying to explain to creationists that the universe is not 6,024 years old.
I give up trying to explain to creationists that Adam and Eve were not the first humans.
I give up trying to explain to creationists that the world was never destroyed by a flood.
I give up trying to explain to literalists that they are not as literal as they think they are.
I give up trying to explain that the Bible is not an inerrant, infallible book written by the Christian God.
I give up trying to explain that Moses did not lead millions of Israelites from Egypt to Canaan.
I give up trying to explain that abortion is not murder.
I give up trying to explain that democratic socialism is not the same as Venezuelan socialism.
I give up trying to explain that communism and socialism are not the same.
I give up trying to explain that democratic socialists are not anti-capitalists.
I give up trying to explain the moral bankruptcy of Donald Trump.
I give up trying to explain that Donald Trump is a racist.
I give up trying to explain that Donald Trump is a sexual predator.
I give up trying to explain that I am not overweight because I eat too much or eat the “wrong” foods.
I give up trying to explain that my pain and debility are caused by actual diseases and medical disorders.
I give up trying to explain why I am depressed.
I give up trying to explain why auto racing on dirt is better than auto racing in asphalt.
I give up trying to explain why I don’t recycle.
And finally, I am too tired to continue with this list, so I give up …
Tomorrow, Loki willing, is another day. Who knows how long or short my “I Give Up” list might be.
What would you like to add to this list? Please share your “I give ups” in the comment section.
About Bruce Gerencser
Bruce Gerencser, 62, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 41 years. He and his wife have six grown children and twelve grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist. For more information about Bruce, please read the About page.
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Socialism, on the other hand, requires a powerful, centralized government for its implementation. This in turn requires a ruling elite, like the old Soviet politburo, that controls every facet of society, spreads the wealth around and enriches itself.
In socialism, which is rooted in Marxism, the God of the Bible is replaced by the god of the state. People no longer need God to help them deal with life; they can now look to the government to solve every problem and meet every need. Faith in God, therefore, is viewed as an enemy of the state.
his is why, during the 20th century, millions of Christians were imprisoned and put to death in socialist/communist regimes such as China, Cambodia, Cuba and the Soviet Union. This is why, alongside the rise of socialism/Marxism in modern America, there is a corresponding rise of hostility toward people of faith.
Have you noticed that the Democrat party seems to be moving further and further from any open identification with God and Christianity? This always happens as a people move from individual liberty to socialism. The god of socialism is a jealous god and will tolerate no rivals.
If you want to understand the passion of the new progressive wing of the Democrat party, this is it. They have visions of power. They have exchanged the God of the Bible for the god of power, which they envision being expressed through themselves in a powerful, centralized government.
The ultimate answer to the challenge of atheistic socialism in American today is not a political one but a spiritual one. America must return to the vision of the founders, who saw liberty and faith as being joined together in an indissoluble bond. They did not believe one could flourish without the other.
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The Bible-believing Christian who takes his faith seriously is socialism’s worse nightmare. This is why we must pray for another Great Awakening across the land. This is why we must challenge the contemporary church to move beyond an entertainment culture and begin training people to be salt and light and live out their faith in this culture.
Socialism teaches that wealth should be held in common ownership, controlled by the state. Hence, the Democrats’ constant push to have government confiscate ever more income and power.
By contrast, the Bible teaches that God owns all things and that we’re merely stewards of His creation. When we look at each of the Ten Commandments, we see that they’re directly at odds with socialism.
You shall have no other gods before Me.
Socialism and its offshoots – communism, fascism, democratic socialism and National Socialism (Nazism) – enshrine the state above all other powers. There is no room for God, which is why socialists are in a permanent war with the church and are bent on creating a faith-free society.
You shall make no idols.
Idols are anything that takes the place of God in the hierarchy of values. Under socialism, sheer power over one’s fellow man is an idol. Another is building utopias – the unicorns of government because such perfect societies do not exist.
You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
When socialists take over a culture, it becomes depraved and perverse. To enforce their new immoral order, socialists openly blaspheme God and particularly Jesus Christ.
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Keep the Sabbath day holy.
Sundays are no different from any other day in socialist societies. In fact, people going to church on a Sunday are identified and often persecuted in places like communist China, where atheism is the official state religion. Even in our market-based society, materialism – a necessary precept of socialism – has pushed respect for the Sabbath to the margins.
Honor your father and your mother.
Socialism has been at war with marriage and family since the French Revolution in 1789.
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You shall not murder.
Many people misread this commandment as a broader order not to kill for any reason, which denies the moral difference between taking innocent human life and executing murderers. Socialists have long promoted abortion – the direct taking of an innocent human life – as a way to “liberate” women and men from parental responsibilities.
You shall not commit adultery.
In the 1960s, Americans became familiar with the term “free love,” but socialists have been promoting it heavily since the early 1800s. Sex outside marriage, prostitution, pornography and abortion all militate against marriage fidelity. Socialists deploy euphemisms like “choice” and “sex work” to cover the retreat from Biblical morality.
You shall not steal.
Socialism is grand theft. It uses the state to take earnings from productive people and redistribute it to create dependency and thus political power for those handing it out. Slavery is 100 percent taxation – when someone else controls the fruits of one’s labor. Socialist countries first control and then seize private property.
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You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
This is not just about telling lies in a witness situation but also about using lies to advance one’s wellbeing. Socialism is built on a mountain of lies about human nature, which is why it eventually must resort to violence.
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You shall not covet.
Socialism’s main engine is envy, stoking resentment against others who have more, even to the point of using violence to get it.
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Coveting divinity got Satan kicked out of Heaven, and it’s what he and his minions continue to peddle in a variety of forms – including pride, envy and socialism.
What follows is an excerpt from a sermon by Trump-supporting Fundamentalist Southern Baptist megachurch pastor Jack Graham. Graham deliberately lies about the history and nature of socialism. In particular, he attempts to paint modern Democratic Socialism with the brush of Soviet-style socialism/communism. Evidently, Graham views getting Trump re-elected more important than accurately representing beliefs and systems he opposes. Democrats should expect this tactic to be repeated time and again as we head toward the November 2020 general election.
Socialism is fundamentally at odds with the Christian worldview and seeks to suppress all peoples in support of the state. No one serious about their Christian faith can be serious about supporting socialism.
Some young people see capitalism, corporate America, as being greedy, without compassion, without concern, and we have to admit that there is a lot of greed in people’s lives. But here’s the thing, young people under 30 have not seen in their lifetime the devastating effects of Soviet-style repression and oppression through socialism and its big bad brother communism.
Socialism is totally secular and is predicated on atheism. Our faith in Jesus Christ is built on the word of God, the revelation of God, that God exists, that we believe in the resurrection of Christ, and with that faith comes freedom to live an abundant life with liberty, but Karl Marx, the father of scientific socialism, considered religion of all kinds, and specifically Christianity, as the opiate of the masses. You’re on drugs if you believe in God.
It would be a catastrophic miscalculation to think that socialist hostility towards religion, and Christianity specifically, has changed in any way since the days of Karl Marx. Socialist countries today are secular in nature, often repressing and oppressing people of faith, all faiths, and particularly are determined to root out Christianity.
Name me one socialist-style country, communist or otherwise, that is open to faith without oppression and suppression of that faith. It is at the very root of this thing called socialism.
In America, socialism has produced a welfare state of sorts, and that will not work for the future of America. It’s not working now.
Every healthy person should work, and that includes senior adults in so-called retirement. The goal of your life is not to get to the beach and better your tan or lower your golf score when you quit working. The goal of your life is to honor God, glorify God, by working hard your entire life and serving with him with what he has given you to use for his glory. That’s the goal of your work life, and it never stops.
Local newspaper editorial pages frequently feature letters from right-wing Republican Christians attacking what they believe is the Devil’s economic policy — socialism. Never mind the fact that few if any of these people could articulately and comprehensively define socialism and differentiate between the various types of socialism. Never mind the fact that the United States has always been to some degree or the other a socialist state. Never mind the fact that many of these letter writers participate in and benefit from socialist programs: Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, public roads, public infrastructure, veteran benefits, Food Stamps, vaccines and flu shots, public education, public parks, etc. These letter writers clamor for a libertarian world where government has little to no role to play outside of national defense. Envision, if you dare, such a world; a world where the moment you pull out of your driveway onto the road, you are required to pay a toll because all roads are privately owned. Imagine a world without laws and regulations; a world without the EPA and FDA; a world governed by one rule: “let the buyer beware.”
Donald Trump, the buffoon currently inhabiting the White House, is waging a trade war, mainly against China. Using punitive, excessive, and unnecessary tariffs, Trump is causing all sorts of economic and social harm. No one has suffered more under Trump’s delusions than American farmers. Grain prices are plummeting, and will only get worse, especially if China punitively cuts off farm imports from the United States and turns to other countries to meet their needs. Farm bankruptcies are on the rise, leading to further agricultural operation consolidation.
Local TV news programs have been featuring local farmers whining about what Trump’s tariffs are doing to their bottom lines. Farmers already operate on razor-thin margins, so I understand them not wanting to face continued financial loss. The irony here is that most local farmers are registered Republicans and voted for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. It’s their chosen one who is saying to them, “bend over and take it like a man.” Trump and his on crack economic advisors, of course, know that rural white Midwestern voters are key to their hope of winning in 2020. Lose farm country and one of 2,022 Democratic candidates running for office will be the next president of Christian America. That’s why Trump has been spending billions of dollars subsidizing American farmers. Not that this is anything new. Farmers have always been on the government teat, suckling price guarantees and other programs meant to stabilize prices and ensure profitability. Farmers benefit from commodity buybacks, government-sponsored insurance programs, land set-aside payments, etc. You know, s-o-c-i-a-l-i-s-m.
Last week, Trump asked for an additional $15 billion in socialist funding for farmers. This is in addition to the $12 billion already allocated for socialist relief checks currently being sent to “suffering” farmers, including large, multi-million-dollar agricultural operations. Why should farmers alone get welfare checks from the U.S. Treasury? Trump’s tariffs are causing all sorts of harm to local manufacturing concerns, including the company that employs my wife and several of our children. Shouldn’t these companies also benefit from Trump’s socialist largesse?
Come November 2020 — as sure as corn, soy beans, and wheat spring forth from Ohio farmland — local farmers will line up at polling stations to vote for Donald Trump. No matter what the man does — and war with Iran is looming on the horizon — he will get their vote. Why? He’s their great white hope, the only man who can stave off atheistic socialism from taking over the world. Cognitive dissonance abounds in America’s heartland, and Trump and his fellow Republicans count on this so they can continue their pillage and destruction. Their goal remains what it has always been: to continue to accumulate vast sums of wealth at the expense of working-class, poor Americans.
Duping Americans into believing that socialism is some sort of evil that will destroy all that is holy and good is key to Republicans holding on to power, both at the state and federal level. One of my objectives as a writer is to help people see that Republican economic policies are harmful to the American people and actually impede social and economic progress. Laissez-faire capitalism has miserably failed, and it’s time for a new economic system to take root and flourish.
About Bruce Gerencser
Bruce Gerencser, 62, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 41 years. He and his wife have six grown children and twelve grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist. For more information about Bruce, please read the About page.
Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section. If you are a first-time commenter, please read the commenting policy before wowing readers with your words. All first-time comments are moderated. If you would like to contact Bruce directly, please use the contact form to do so.
Donations are always appreciated. Donations on a monthly basis can be made through Patreon. One-time donations can be made through PayPal.
A new Harris Poll reveals that Generation Z has a more “positive view of the word ‘socialism’ than previous generations, and—along with Millennials—are more likely to embrace socialistic policies and principles than past generations.”
Should we, after three generations of government-controlled education, even be surprised over Millennial and Gen Z generations leaning toward socialism and paganism? “What’s in the well comes up in the bucket.”
Secular humanists took public education hostage in the early 20th century and show no sign of letting up. Present-day “education programs” include for 13-14-year-old girls include sexual practices that equate to, “I like you” —all deftly packaged under the guise of “health” and “tolerance.”
Before long the National Education Association (NEA) will give preference for eighth-grade field trips to include San Francisco’s Folsom Street Fair over sightseeing tours of the nation’s capital and historic Williamsburg.
If America is to survive, secularism will have to be ousted from the marketplace. The death-grip of secular bullies and brawlers on public education, universities and academia has marred and scarred the culture like a spiritual cancer. Its detrimental impact is on display in each and every last one of the cultural mountains of influence: education, academia, newsrooms, sports, the courts, big business, Hollywood and medicine.
If you’ve ever read anything written by any progressive over the age of forty, chances are pretty good that you’ve been exposed to a certain weary, self-indulgent, spiritually-agonized tone. It is very recognizable, like the smell of decay that’s characteristic of a swamp. By comparison, leftists under the age of forty are likely to have more-or-less the same tone that they were born with — the high-pitched tone of an infant that is not getting its way. Older leftists have usually run out of this youthful vigor, just like the rest of us. They do not participate in Antifa riots on the streets. They think about such youthful protests with a sense of nostalgia, remembering their wild, radical college days — whether they actually experienced them or not. Lost in a kind of communal introspection, they gather to have a coffee and a chat about how infinitely, heartbreakingly hard it is to endure the misery of the world. It would be vulgar to point out that a nice income and a nice house in a nice neighborhood can do a lot to ease this unbearable sense of soul-wrenching angst. Moral anguish can actually be quite comfortable if you can manage to do it safely at a distance.
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The disease of progressivism is now widespread, though probably not the majority position some imagine it to be. It has infected all classes, from cynical elites who wish to placate the last shriveled remnants of their consciences to the cynical poor who wish to be made unpoor by a government willing to pick pockets on their behalf. The cultural decay is deep, giving people a false sense of goodness based of uttering magic words rather than on the difficult and costly work of genuinely moral behavior. The real obscenity of leftist virtue-signaling isn’t merely that it’s unproductive and self-serving, but that leftists are so blinded that their own hypocrisy is lost on them. What does virtue-signaling accomplished that could not be done more honestly with a secret gesture or a secret handshake? What does the middle-class progressive really want other than identification with “the enlightened,” the intelligentsia, and with those who wield power?
I will hardly be the first to observe that the left long ago lost the battle over facts. Ghettoes, crime, and overdose deaths are facts. The chaos in Western Europe is a fact. The degeneration of Detroit into semi-rural scrub forest is a fact. The “arc of history,” pretty as it sounds, is nothing but a literary dream. A castle of mere words. Socialism has always been, at heart, a literary façade for the same old centralization of power — a petty tyranny at the hands of self-appointed and self-righteous planners and intellectuals. It’s a lie. In its death throes it has even lost the charm of being a beautiful lie.
But there are also some things happening now that previous generations would have regarded as unthinkable.
Socialism is now on the ballot in “the land of the free,” when freedom and socialism are polar opposites. There are multiple candidates running for office across our land that are avowed socialists. Many of them try to dress it up by calling it “democratic socialism,” but that makes as much sense as the term “fragrant skunk.” Government ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods robs a nation and its individuals of their freedom and liberty and eventually destroys that nation.
Abortion is sacrosanct in America by somewhere around half of the population, though every abortion ends the life of a child and minorities are disproportionately affected. African-Americans have 27.1 abortions per thousand of women ages 15-44 to whites having only 10 per thousand, while whites make up 76.6 percent of the population compared to African-Americans making up just 13.5 percent.
Religious liberty is under assault in a great many state houses and courthouses. The great “cake wars” and “flower wars” show this clearly. Progressives gasp at the notion of the “slippery slope” of allowing people the freedom of conscience to refuse to do things that violate their religious sensibilities. But they never seem to ask about the other side of the slippery slope, as in “Well, if we allow people to force other people to make the cake or the flowers, we are going out on a slippery slope, and where does it stop? Can we also force the African-American baker to make a rebel flag cake? Can we force the Muslim deli to provide ham sandwiches and bacon for a church gathering? Can we force the Jewish florist to make a lovely arrangement for a Neo Nazi group to use at an anti-Jewish meeting?
But there are also some things happening now that previous generations would have regarded as unthinkable.