More Christians show us the true path of morality

[skepticscott]

Beyond the details of the criminal act of a teacher who had sex with a 15-year-old girl, the most surprising aspect of the case likely was the 115 letters sent to the judge asking for leniency.

The former South Christian High School teacher had sex numerous times with the teenager at his Jefferson Street SE home over the course of last spring and summer before she told a camp counselor what was going on.

Valkema was arrested, jailed and fired in quick order, but many students, co-workers, friends, family members and leaders of southern Kent County churches stood behind the admitted sex offender.
In letters entered into the public court file and reviewed by The Press, the majority steer clear of holding the victim responsible, and they range from asking the judge for no prison time for Valkema to asking that his period of incarceration take into consideration the entirety of Valkema’s life beyond his criminal sexual acts.

Among the letters are nearly three dozen from students, 16 from family members, 26 from friends, 22 from fellow educators and the balance from people in the religious community.
The letters came from Utah, Valkema’s home state of New Jersey and from throughout Michigan. The letters are signed by principals; teachers; nurses; Christian youth counselors; staff from Valkema’s alma mater, Calvin College; and several from the Christian youth group Young Life for which Valkema was a leader.

Neither pastor would answer whether they would ask for mercy if their 15-year-old daughter was the victim. It was a question posed by the victim’s father, who said he was disappointed so many supported Valkema in a public manner while he felt his daughter essentially was abandoned.
“You know how many letters of support were for my daughter, the victim? Zero,” the girl’s father said Thursday. “My daughter used to be in sports, used to be in band and now, nothing.”
The daughter now attends a different school because she was ostracized at South Christian, her father said.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2010/11/judge_receives_115_letters_of.html

[bluestateguy]

1. Probably all Mike Huckabee supporters

We all know how LENIENT he is on crime.

[JuniperLea]

2. This is very sad...

I wonder what their motivation was to support the criminal and ostracize the victim? Weird... and NOT very Christian, IMHO.

[trotsky]

3. Christian is what Christians do.

Otherwise you go down the path of No True Scotsman.

[humblebum]

4. So does that mean that atheism is what atheists do?nt

[ZombieHorde]

7. Atheist may be a demographic, but it is not really a group.

Secular Humanists may be a group, but general atheism is no more a group than general theism.

[skepticscott]

8. Apparently you don't see the idiotic

false equivalence in that statement. Atheism is not an overaching worldview and it doesn't tell you anything about how to behave or treat people, which Christianity presumes to do. Sorry that you can't paint atheism with the brush that you'd like to, but please continue to amuse the rational people here by trying.

[humblebum]

9. Organized atheism does have a history and yes it is a

worldview. http://www.atheistconvention.org.au/

[darkstar3]

10. You keep linking to that as if it proves some sort of point.

You fail to realize that even if some atheists organize, it doesn't constitute some monolithic and terrible monster you'd like to label "organized atheism". Why, you ask? Well, in order to see the other side of the coin, you would have to refer to Hinduism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, and many other faiths as one monolithic label called "organized theism". Are they organized? Do they constitute one group? Absolutely not.

Your choice of language reveals almost as much about you as your incessant need to bash atheists on this board. Now, do you think you could post something that wasn't completely worthless?

[skepticscott]

12. Atheism is a lack of belief in gods

And that is all it is. Please explain how that is an overarching worldview that tells people how to behave and treat others. And try to do it without your usual uninformed conflation of atheism with anti-theism or with the overarching philosophies that it is only a small facet of.

[humblebum]

13. Keep telling yourself that , but a Global Convention of Atheists

does kinda produce the effect of appearing to convene with a purpose. I know! They're all getting together to discuss how little they have in common.

[darkstar3]

14. See #10,

and do yourself a favor: get your money back for all of your education.

[skepticscott]

15. Please explain

how atheism is an overarching worldview that dictates how to behave and treat people. Stop ducking the question and stop using your own ignorance as evidence of anything (if you can), YOU linked to website...find the answer to my question there and post it for everyone to see, or admit that you can't and go away.

[humblebum]

28. Quite possibly I see something you do not. NT

[skepticscott]

29. You do realize

how lame and foolish you look, I hope? And that innocent electrons suffered and died so that you could post that?

You know nothing and have nothing. Go away until you do.

[ZombieHorde]

24. Do you consider theists to be a group? nt

[cleanhippie]

11. Only if its done in the name of atheism, so no.

or did you mean

militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl: militant atheist :rofl:

[trotsky]

16. If there were one particular book from which all atheists took their philosophy...

and said book was so poorly written, haphazardly compiled, and hopelessly contradictory in such a way to justify pretty much any behavior one chooses...

then yes, atheism would be what atheists do.

[DeSwiss]

5. K&R n/t

[ZombieHorde]

6. "Neither pastor would answer..."

"Neither pastor would answer whether they would ask for mercy if their 15-year-old daughter was the victim."

Which leads one to ask, why not? The question is pretty simple and straightforward. I would feel like a fool if I went to a pastor who could not answer such an easy question.

[Sal316]

17. Ummm.....

What are you getting at here?

That people are actually asking for leniency? That they're not headed off with torches and pitchforks? What?

The hardest part about loving your neighbor is loving those who you don't think deserve it. But those are precisely who you should.

[trotsky]

18. As usual, you miss the point.

Nothing wrong with leniency and forgiveness.

Hypocrisy, however, is something that a lot of Christians are pretty damn good at.

“You know how many letters of support were for my daughter, the victim? Zero,” the girl’s father said Thursday.

[Mariana]

19. These 115 folks don't seem to be having a hard time at all

loving their rapist neighbor. It would be nice if they had a little love left over for his victim.

I don't see why they can't love the rapist, pray for him, minister to him and all that, and still ask for the maximum sentence in the hope of preventing him from raping more underage girls.

[cleanhippie]

20. How come you abandoned our other conversation?

What gives?

[darkstar3]

21. Why am I not surprised that you would defend the defenders?

It's is not love for their neighbor, but patriarchal horseshit that drove those people to write letters of support for a rapist. Patriarchal horseshit that is not only heavily perpetuated by their faith, but that was created by it. Patriarchal horseshit that you are all too eager to defend.

[Sal316]

22. Wow...you must know everything!

It's is not love for their neighbor, but patriarchal horseshit....

Exactly what factual evidence do you have to support your assertion? Have you asked those that wrote the letters? Are you privy to their inner thoughts and motivations?

Please enlighten us.

Would you apply the same opinion to the parents of the victims of the Amish schoolhouse shooting who raised money for and supported the shooter's family in their grief?

I mean, hell, to you it's all patriarchal horseshit that motivates people to do such things.

[darkstar3]

23. When the attacker is a male in power,

and the victim a female without such power, in a system that perpetuates such positions and defends them to the hilt, I have no problem recognizing the response of the community members for what it is.

I'd ask that you imagine the situation in reverse if you want proof. Think of how patently ridiculous it would be if a woman pastor admitted to having sex with a 15 year old boy and then had over a hundred letters of support written for her from the community.

First you'd have to find a female pastor, no mean feat even in denominations which nominally support it.
Second, you'd have to find one that preyed on boys, which would be another shocker when you consider that the "prey" in our society and in that religion are generally female.
Finally, her congregation and community would have to support her in writing even in the face of her admission of guilt. Good luck with that.

If you can't even admit that Christianity incorporates and perpetuates patriarchy, then you are deluding yourself.

[skepticscott]

26. If you can't figure out for yourself

the mentality and motivation of a community that expresses so much support for a (male) rapist and absolutely none at all for his (female) victim, then you're in the grip of an ignorance that no one here can help you with.

[skepticscott]

27. They can love him all they want

but this story serves very well to point out the underlying mentality at the heart of fundy Xstian thinking, attitudes and morality. What kind of a group would express so much support for a rapist, while expressing NONE for his victim, and in fact ostracizing her? Certainly not one that has any standing to teach or dictate morals to anybody.

And please spare us the "these people aren't behaving like True Christians" baloney...been there, smacked that down.

[jemelanson]

30. These people who support the rapist and ostracizing the victim are

acting very Christian Like....the poor male rapists was tempted by the wicked, evil, female and as such she is at fault....that is how the Christians have acted for their entire history....


There are plenty who will claim that the statement I made is not true...however....it is. The Christian religion and it's many and varied flavors have fought against every battle to overcome slavery, civil rights, women's rights and even the woman's right to vote. Now there are some very good people to try to follow the teachings of Jesus and are good people. The organized bunch are every bit as evil as the Taliban.

[skepticscott]

31. There can't be much doubt

that a lot of people supporting the rapist are thinking exactly that, though they don't dare come right out and say it. And of course that still leaves unanswered the question of whether they would react the same way if it were THEIR 15 year old daughter.

[backscatter712]

25. Who here's read The God Virus by Darrel Ray?

The book mentions the difference of treatment between ordinary people and vectors of the God Virus, namely preachers, religious teachers and the like.

Cultivating a good vector to spread the God Virus is difficult and expensive, so the vectors get a huge amount of leeway when they're caught misbehaving. That's why this guy's getting all those letters, why all those pedophile priests got away with boinking altar boys for decades, getting shuffled from church to church, why Ted Haggard's getting back into the preaching business, etc. Can't waste a good vector - they're hard to replace.