First They Shut You Up, Then You Will Be Made to Care

I have to quibble, slightly, with the Washington Free Beacon’s Sonny Bunch. In a piece last week Sonny wrote that he did not think I was quite right with my phrase “you will be made to care.” Instead, he thought it should be “you will be made to shut up.”

I would suggest that he stops too soon. Yes, along the way to making people care, many of us must be shut up first.

In fact, we see that is the initial play with the left. A young man last week pointed out that transgenderism is largely a mental health issue and started receiving threats on twitter and general harassment. The Fire Chief in Atlanta referred to homosexuality as a sin and lost his job. Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty quoted scripture and the left tried to drive him from the airwaves. The Benham Brothers are evangelical Christians and had their TV deal cancelled for offending the gay mafia.

Christians will be made to shut up. Those who question political correctness will be made to shut up. Now there is a new troubling story out. A tenured professor at Marquette University lost his tenure and was fired for a blog post in which he took issue with a graduate student who told a class only bigots and homophobes could question gay marriage. The one student who did question it was failed. Again, a tenured professor lost his job for raising questions about the appropriateness of a graduate student’s class instruction on gay marriage.

Yes, they’ll try to shut us up. But that is only the halfway point.

As I have written before, particularly on the issue of gay marriage, gay rights activists want the entire veneer of normal. They want the whole package. That involves the Christian florist being forced to provide flowers for a gay wedding. That involves driving from the airwaves anyone who calls homosexuality a sin. That will, eventually, involve forcing pastors to marry gay couples. After all, normally weddings happen in a church. For those of you who say this will never happen, we’re already about to move on to polyamory, which was also, like gay marriage, never going to happen. Just wait.

I’ve had more than one employee of major Fortune 500 companies tell me they are “strongly encouraged” to participate in gay pride events. I have had corporate employees tell me they have had to fill out surveys, with their name on them so that there is no anonymity, that ask frank questions about their views of gay rights.

Eventually, you will be made to care. Once the gay mafia has established that everyone agrees with them because all other voices have been made silent, those of you still thinking you do not have to pick a side or can compromise and nuance your position will have to take a side. You will be made to care about gay marriage one way or the other and if you care the wrong way, good luck finding or keeping a job.

I encounter, on a near weekly basis, more and more Christians who say gay rights is increasingly becoming a modern mark of the beast — either celebrate gay rights or be forced to the sidelines of society. I don’t hold to that theological view, but I completely understand where they are coming from. And it is only going to get worse, requiring a braver, more vocal church.

Sonny Buch is right that you will be made to shut up. But then you will be made to care. And that is precisely why people of faith cannot shut up.

The post First They Shut You Up, Then You Will Be Made to Care appeared first on RedState.