Compliments of the New Season! I know that for some people 2012 was a challenging year but we must be grateful that we have made it through. Some did not because they perished on SA’s dangerous roads. What is it about SA drivers? I mean I almost got into an accident this week in one of the traffic circles leading to the airport.
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The other driver decided to dash into the circle while I was already inside and then his car just stalled in front of me. I had to dead break with my wife and baby sitting behind me on the back seat. You know this kind of situation. You are angry and exasperated but you have to restrain yourself because you are a believer. If this was a once off incident then it would not matter much but it is actually an all too familiar sight in this country.
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The problem with irregular things that happen with such regularity is the fact that you get numbed to them. They get to be normal such that the actual “normal” looks abnormal. I mean how many of you would expect a taxi driver to give you a right of way on the road? Very few of us would expect such courtesy and yet we should. What we have come to expect is abnormality that has now become normal.
Desensitised
Now that is where the problem lies. We are being desensitised and made to believe that right is wrong and wrong is right. This goes for every facet of life in this country. Consider how those who are at the forefront of the fight for the rights of homosexuals are labouring to convince us that this lifestyle is not a deviation but a norm. In other words it is the new “normal” and our old “normal” is now abnormal.
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If you are seen to be casting aspersion on this lifestyle you get vilified and accused of being intolerant and bigoted. What this means is that you are an exception to mainstream views and you are treated as such. What the homosexual group have in their arsenal is a powerful liberal and combative media and academics that double up as social activists. Both the media and these academics have arrogated to themselves the right to determine our country’s morality.
They have the much-vaunted constitution in the corner and chapter 9 institutions who are often unsympathetic to issues that are dear to people of faith. A Christian training centre in Bloemfontein has landed itself in hot water because they dared to suggest that homosexuals can be rehabilitated. The story of Creare Training Centre was carried on page 6 of last weekend’s Sunday Times. The strange thing is that what this institution is accused of is a view that is held by many South Africans.
Whether you say they can be “cured” or rehabilitated, many South Africans believe that homosexuals can be changed from their orientation. This view does not equate to homophobia which is classified as strong dislike and fear of homosexuals. Accusing everyone who questions the homosexual lifestyle as being homophobic is an attempt to silence and shut down an important social discourse.
It is also not true that people who speak against homosexuality are fuelling violence and rapes against gays and lesbians. This kind of an argument is way too simplistic and a vain attempt to create a connection where none exists. My view is that people who run privately funded institutions should have the right to determine an admission criterion.
Level of discrimination we should accept
Public Benefit organisations are established with certain objectives and values and they attract funding from people who support those objectives and values. This means that these entities should be assessed differently from public institutions that owe their existence to the public treasury. In other words there is a level of “discrimination” we should learn to live with.
I cannot enlist my child in a Muslim school and then complain about the frequency or manner that Muslims conduct their prayers. It is unfair to expect the whole ethos of the school to change because a Christian child has been admitted. The founder of Creare, Pastor Cornelius van Heyningen, was quoted in the article as saying, “we are catering for those who say ‘I want to change as a homosexual’. That’s not saying no homosexuals are allowed.’
What is wrong with such a statement? I can understand the fact that homosexual lobby groups would be irritated by anyone who seems to be maligning the homosexual lifestyle but accusing everyone of having a strong dislike and fear of homosexuals is taking things too far. When visiting another country I get shocked with cars that come to a dead stop when I am on the pedestrian crossing.
This is because I have become accustomed to the new “normal” in this country where drivers think it is an option to stop for a pedestrian rather than a rule. How much have you lowered your standards in 2012?
[Taxi Photo: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/7780380.stm]
It looks like we are living in an anything goes society !!! God have mercy on us.
A well written article – thank you.
Thank you Helen. Indeed God should have mercy on us.
How true! It is politically correct to regard homosexual behaviour as “normal” when it is not. Heterosexuality is physiologically normal. Therefore Homosexuality is abnormal. That’s why no electrician would think of matching a male plug with another male plug. That’s why heterosexual couples can usually beget children, and homosexual couples can’t. It is only political correctness that insists on regarding homosexuality as normal. This doesn’t mean that normal people un-influenced by political correctness are homophobic, making it the equivalent of Racism. If there is but one person who has changed their sexual orientation, then the Racism analogy falls away – for no-one has ever changed their race. If homosexuality was genetic it would have died out millenia ago, because the ‘gene’ would be unable to reproduce itself. It is a learned behaviour, and Jesus is in the business of changing aberrant behaviours into godly behaviours.
We affirm this in relation to other aberrant behaviours: hatred, laziness, drunkenness, adultery, child-abuse, selfishness etc. Why label those like Creare as ‘bad people’ when they advocate rehabilitation of homosexuals?