In Christ, I strive to serve the Father as Jesus served within the Jewish culture and religious system that was ruled by the oligarchs of his time. Jesus preached repentance to them; he did not take up the sword to make them change.

So like the ancient temple, the power structure of the UMC will eventually collapse — its demise being the weight of its own arrogance and self interest.

Committee membership is stacked to produce a desired outcome. Legislation gets bogged down in minutia of amendments and amendments to amendments about half way through. Then at the end there is a huge backlog of resolutions that must be dealt with. These are all thrown into an omnibus bill that is passed without ever seeing the light of day based on the vote of a small group of committee members.

That is how our social principles has come to be a play book for the left. They use these questionable “votes” as a mandate from General Conference.

How can the abuse of the political process be stopped? Can it be?

The Good Samaritan helped his neighbor. Point: people help people. The government’s job is to protect us, not run our companies, bankrupt us or spread the wealth (or change our Constitution through the courts or administration). Thanks again to Washington, Jefferson, et al.

Of course, the church should advocate moral values from the Bible. And, it needs to properly sift and interpret for us.

For other thoughts on rights, see the 3rd Continental Congress’ Articles of Freedom.

I do NOT join my church in supporting this. UM leadership is not speaking for me.

Do I have to rethink my being a United Methodist, or will my church rethink its stance on this and other “social justice” issues that are at base leftist politics (that end up hurting people)?

This week I feel betrayed by both my government and my church.

I was disappointed, angry, and saddened that this self-serving article written by the Bishop was sent out. I wrote to her and expressed my feelings, somewhat adamantly.

After reading this blog post, I am even more disheartened by the UM leadership. Regardless of where anyone stands on this issue, the bottom line is that there is no truth, no honesty, no integrity as to how this language was implemented into the the Book of Discipline. Then, to have the Bishop quote it as some great policy that includes quoting Scripture makes it even more fraudulent.

It is sad — and we wonder why the Methodist Church is 80 percent decaying or dystrophic (Dan R. Dick, Vital Signs).

(Editor’s note: You can read the above-mentioned article by Bishop Susan Hassinger here.)

A great book on the subject of helping the poor is The Tragedy of American Compassion by Marvin Olasky. Olasky recounts the history of compassion in America, including how many modern citizens have absolved themselves from personal responsibility for taking care of their neighbor by co-opting “the government” to do it.

The book is an interesting read in light of recent statistics that show people who believe in bigger government tend to be less charitable in their personal giving.

(Editor’s note: To learn more about the demographic and social characteristics of generous givers, see Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservatism by Arthur C. Brooks (Basic Books, 2007).)

To secure this right, government must pay for the medical services anyone needs. To do that, it uses its taxing powers, or — as we are seeing in the current House bill — government forces everyone to buy the insurance policies it chooses for us (and punishes those who resist with up to five years in federal prison). Because doctors and pharmaceutical companies are needed to serve this right, the government must reach out to control them, as well.

All other rights (as we understand them from the U.S. Constitution) are rights of autonomy, i.e. they are rights that protect people against government control of their lives.

Funny how Jesus challenges the comfortable political beliefs of so many modern day Pharisees.

(Editor’s note: The “Good Samaritan” parable is found in Luke 10:25-37.)

While I agree that Rand’s ideas conflict with Scripture (no surprise there), where in Scripture do you find the fundamental human right to health care?

H.R. 676, a fund-raising mechanism for health-care reform that the UMC also supports, advocates a single payer system — period! I believe there are other ways to make health care more competitive and bring prices down, besides dismantling the entire health care system that we have today — e.g., deregulate health insurance to increase competition, expand Medicaid for a higher % of the poverty level, allow the unemployed to get Medicaid while they draw benefits, etc.

I do not understand why the United Methodist Church supports single payer, especially with hundreds (thousands?) of UM Elders receiving great benefits. If the UMC is aware of this, and the church as a whole is willing to sacrifice its outstanding benefits for the sake of the poor, then I really applaud everyone for that! Not even Congress is willing to make that sacrifice!

One of the reasons our infant mortality rate is measured higher than other countries, in addition to those already listed, is this: we actually measure these things better than other nations. The statistics gathered for many other countries are simply less accurate than ours (ergo, they can be more easily manipulated to make them look good). Admittedly, that’s not the whole story. We still have work to do in this area.

But the health-care systems so often held up as “helping the least of these” better than we do, upon further analysis, actually do not. The Medicaid system does a pretty good job of taking care of folks in the U.S., especially when compared to some foreign systems. Look at the waiting times in Britain and Canada. Hospitals in Japan are going broke. The French system is going broke. Doctors in Germany are going on strike. If a system is not sustainable then it is not a good system. We need to improve our system, but we compare more favorably than many commentators suggest.

Regarding the Ayn Rand quote, I am not asking anyone to become a devotee of Rand or objectivism. What I am asking is that the rational arguments about “rights” be analyzed and grappled with. I have listened with an open-mind to many who say health-care is a basic right. I have yet to be convinced.

Health care is a fundamental human right. To our national shame, far more secular nations do a better job of following Jesus’ admonition to care for the least of these. Our infant mortality rate of 44th in the world is a national sin.

Lack of public health care is like abortion; in both cases children die because it is more convenient. Abortion may be more moral, in that it can sometimes save the life of the mother.

I am proud that the UMC stands up for what is right in the face of a society where Christianity is too often found championing a system in which a person’s worth is solely determined by their wealth. (See: health care, justice, education, political representation, etc.)

(Editor’s note: The infant mortality rate in the U.S. is closely correlated with the high percentage of premature births here; preterm births occur primarily among teenage mothers, older women, and smokers. For details, see “Preemies Raise U.S. Infant Mortality Rate” from WebMD Health News.)

This is rather scary and causing me to ReThink Church in an entirely different way.

At the time it may not have seemed like a major decision, and accepted without debate — but in light of where we are today, the value of that vote has changed immensely in importance.

And what is the GBCS agenda regarding the health-care debate? It’s simple: to invoke the “health-care-is-a-right” argument to push for greater and greater government control over our lives. Their faith in government appears to be as great as their faith in God.

But back to the basic question: Is health care a right?

Here are some interesting observations on the subject of rights by Ayn Rand:

“Right is a moral principle defining and sanctioning a man’s freedom of action in a social context. There is only one fundamental right (all the others are its consequences or corollaries): a man’s right to his own life. Life is a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action; the right to life means the right to engage in self-sustaining and self-generated action — which means: the freedom to take all the actions required by the nature of a rational being for the support, the furtherance, the fulfillment and the enjoyment of his own life. (Such is the meaning of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.)

The concept of a “right” pertains only to action — specifically, to freedom of action. It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men.

Thus, for every individual, a right is the moral sanction of a positive — of his freedom to act on his own judgment, for his own goals, by his own voluntary, uncoerced choice. As to his neighbors, his rights impose no obligations on them except of a negative kind: to abstain from violating his rights.

The right to life is the source of all rights — and the right to property is their only implementation. Without property rights, no other rights are possible. Since man has to sustain his life by his own effort, the man who has no right to the product of his effort has no means to sustain his life. The man who produces while others dispose of his product, is a slave.