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Abortion, African American, anniversary, breaker, civil, example, God, hero, law, Montgomery Alabama, Montgomery Bus Boycott, parenthood, planned, rights, Rosa Park, Rosa Parks, United States, United States Capitol rotunda, women
I would like to be known as a person who is concerned about freedom and equality and justice and prosperity for all people. – Rosa Parks
Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and who was instrumental in the SBC’s 1995 racial reconciliation resolution, once said:
“Rosa Parks was a great woman who was committed to uncovering wrong and doing right. She said her act of civil disobedience was simply a result of being tired of the unfair treatment of black Americans. Rosa Parks stated it was her faith in God that gave her the strength and courage to persevere in a culture that denied basic human rights to African Americans. Throughout her life, she demonstrated a quiet and dignified strength in standing for justice and equal rights for all Americans.” [emphasis mine, ed.] (online source)
There will be many evangelicals, along with the world, who laud Rosa Parks today. Already, as I write, one influential blogger has stated “one of the things we can be thankful for is the gift and grace of Rosa Parks.”
That’s cheeky.
She will be remembered and touted as the female hero of 1955 who stood against injustice and one who possessed the courage, the intestinal fortitude to stand defiantly against an ungodly law of segregation; a woman who had ‘rights’ as a human being, and demanded, in her own quiet way, to have them.
Bologna.
When did it become ‘Christian’ to celebrate criminals? She is not a hero, what she did was wrong and her exaltation by many evangelicals is nothing short of idolatry and the attempted robbing of God of His glory.
Political correctness and multiculturalism stinks on some days worse than others. This is one of them. I’ll make this short.
Rosa Parks broke the law, and what happened? She received decades of accolades and a state funeral, earned Presidential/Gubernatorial proclamations ordering flags at half-staff.
Think about this. This woman broke the law, and yet, after she died:
- Her funeral was 7 hours long, broadcast on television.
- She laid “in state” in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, making her the first woman and second Negro ever to receive this honor, and an estimated 50,000 people walked by and viewed her casket.
She is honored for breaking a law. We are a nation of laws. Right or wrong, citizens must obey the laws of this land – unless those laws cause us to disobey God in His written Word. There are legal ways to make amends of unjust laws, and procedures to follow. Rosa Parks light-minded defiance of the laws of the land is a poor, even sinful example, and should not be held up as a courageous act, unless you want to talk about sinning courageously.
Yet, there is something even more disturbing about the Rosa Parks story that has somehow escaped those evangelicals who continue to perpetuate the heroin worship of Rosa Parks’ “strength and courage to persevere in a culture that denied basic human rights…” as Richard Land has said; namely, her support and work with Planned Parenthood. We don’t hear anything about that do we?
Where was Rosa’s strength and courage, her faith in God, and her much touted Christianity – where was her defense of basic human rights while, in her latter years, she served on the Board of Advocates of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America?? Why did she refuse to stand up for the basic human rights of unborn children?
It’s a valid question and something to think about.
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Kinda unfair to label her a criminal for breaking a clearly unjust and, frankly, unbiblical law. I’m no fan of the Civil Rights Movement – its civic religion is indeed robbing God of its glory, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater…
But social justice feeeeels sooo good!
Douglas – I dare say this country’s bad laws in that day were far less unjust than Rome’s slave laws of Paul’s day. And what instruction did he give in Scripture? Let the Word of God be our guide.
1 Corinthians 7:20-24 (New King James Version)
20 Let each one remain in the same calling in which he was called. 21 Were you called while a slave? Do not be concerned about it; but if you can be made free, rather use it. 22 For he who is called in the Lord while a slave is the Lord’s freedman. Likewise he who is called while free is Christ’s slave. 23 You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of men. 24 Brethren, let each one remain with God in that state in which he was called.
But it wasn’t slavery in the 1960s, was it, brother? Rather, it was segregation and unjust treatment on the basis of race. Kinda comparing apples and oranges… (And for what it’s worth, social justice, as defined today by many, is nothing more than importing the liberal heresy of a social gospel into evangelical circles)
Agreed, ethnic (there’s only one race among humans) segregation and mistreatment on such bases is different from ancient slavery. Slavery in those days was not as most today imagine it to be. But ancient slavery was a worse condition than being a second class citizen in 20th century USA.
And we agree on the social justice/social gospel being another gospel, which is no gospel at all.
Am I missing something here. I’m thinking you can’t be serious. It was illegal to hide Jews in Germany, do we rant about them breaking the law. It was illegal to worked in the “underground railroad” to free those who were slaves. Do we rant about them breaking the law. It is illigal to worship in some home churches in China. do we rant about them breaking the law. The list goes on and on.
Rosa Parks served on the Board of Advocates of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Is anyone mentioning that? Does that bother you at all? What about the unborn?
Rosa Parks should have moved to the back of the bus, it was the law of the land. But as a white person who, if I lived at that time with my beliefs as they are now. I would not make her move. Hiding Jews from the Germans wasn’t petty as making someone move to the back of the bus. It was a life and death decision. Underground railroad would not be something I’d do because it was against the law. I would not turn anyone in for doing it. It was illegal to worship Christ during Emperor Nero’s reign. But Peter, Paul and John did it anyway.
“Underground railroad would not be something I’d do because it was against the law. I would not turn anyone in for doing it.”
Then if helping slaves escape to freedom is a crime, by not reporting it, you are therefore an accessory and thus a criminal as well. To be consistent anyway.
So was Paul an accessory to a crime when instead of turning in Onesimus to the Roman authorities he led him to the Lord and sent him back to Philemon to seek forgiveness. According to Roman law Onesimus should have been branded a runaway.
“There are legal ways to make amends of unjust laws, and procedures to follow.”
Please explain in more detail what procedures you would follow if you had stepped onto a bus, paid your fare like everyone else, and been told to give your seat to someone else.
I would like to hear more about these procedures that Rosa Parks might have availed herself of. Again, please document these with historical references. Examples of court cases from the period where African Americans successfully sued to have their Constitutional rights recognized would be acceptable. Also helpful would be cases where the governor of Alabama utilized National Guard or state militia to protect African Americans from rape, murder, and other violence to their person or property.
Once you provide documentation of your claims, we can take your above premise seriously.
Rosa Parks and Planned Parenthood. What of the rights of the unborn? You don’t care about that? Take this seriously friend.
I understood the point of the blog post to center around Parks refusing to sit at the back of the bus, not abortion. Of course I care about Abortion, I am a follower of Christ. You have presented two completely different issues. My point is that we do have the right to engage in social protest. So back to the point of your post. It appears that the day is coming when the Church will be charged with a “hate crime” for preaching that homosexuality is a sin. Will you be willing to break the “law” and preach the truth? What about those in the China underground Church, will you say that they should stop meeting because it is against the law. As I wrote earlier, the list can go on and on. Parks happened to be one of many who started to take a social protest against the immoral, unchristian discrimination which the Black man was placed.
No, the post was the Rosa parks Planned Parenthood connection that no one mentions, rarely anyways. My friend, obey the law -unless, as I pointed out in the post (and you perhaps overlooked?), it causes you to disobey God according to His written Word. Romans, Acts.
I am taking it very seriously. I do not believe she was a saint, and if as you state she participated in ANYTHING Planned Parenthood did, she was an accessory to murder as well.
You have absolutely NO argument from me whatsoever about the rights of the unborn. I’m right there with you.
Parks sinned by disobeying the civil magistrate. We should not celebrate her sin. Giving up her seat to a white man would not have caused her to sin, so she should have given it up. The principle is not difficult to discern. Individual cases might be, but this one was not. Her act of defiance was sinful.
Our sinful natures cause us to distort clear Biblical teaching and disobey laws when we find it convenient to do so. Parks was the same way.