Monday, 9 October 2017

Think after me, or I will be after you!

I note with alarm that “Balliol College Oxford bans Christians from freshers fair”. I am stuck for words – which isn’t like me at all! Fake news? Not if it is in the Guardian! Am I going potty? Why has the C.U. been banned from one of Oxford’s Colleges? I must protest against Pottster's egologicalism! F Potts is a highly intelligent young man, and I can assure my readers that he is a very engaging person, even affable. But intelligence and wisdom are not necessarily synonyms, and I am speaking from experience, just in case anyone may wish to accuse me of taking the moral high ground. 
So Potts wants the Christian Union banned, and he was obviously empowered from on high to implement the edict. It will embolden him, no doubt! But a ban? On what grounds? ‘Gleichschaltung’ in Oxford?! Think after me, or I will be after you! Just as Orwell predicted!
I deplore the oppression of minorities, but I must insist that Christians are commanded to love all men and women (if such language is still permissible!) Can there be a higher ethic? Yet Potts wants such folks to be gagged! I note he makes no mention of Muslims, but let's not go there! 
Does the C.U. encourage neo-colonialism, when lesser mortals could not even explain this vacuous term? I doubt whether this blanket term (a pretext for oppression) has any meaning at all, except what the left want it to mean! Who could write an essay on it, even on a postage stamp? 
Christians have always at the forefront of social reform in the 19th century, and Oxford university was not exactly founded by atheists! Ask C.S. Lewis! I gather from the Balliol website that ‘it is thanks to the regular support of thousands of alumni that Balliol is a college that is accessible to talented students whatever their background’. Accessible to all, except the Christian Union, that is!
If Pott’s is right – well, he would not say that he is – then why not also ban oversea students from countries that oppress women, or execute homosexuals, or torture Christians? And why not ban any that advocate a male-female anthropology? Metallica, come to my aid: ‘Exit: light’ Enter: night Take my hand We're off to never never land!’
It is always bad for any democracy to attack freedom to speech, whether at Westminster or in Oxford. Someone is running scared of just a handful of Christians, who put their hands down for coffee? What an irony! What madness!
Marxism, now infiltrating and indoctrinating our academic institutions, of course, has failed millions of people all over the world. It doesn’t work! Never has done, and never will! Its epistemological basis is rotten to the core! It is always completely incompatible with human freedom and invariably shows utter contempt for liberty of conscience! If it could, it would have strangled the Christ-child in the cradle, rather than having to wait for another 33 years for the crucifixion!
At the root of this ban one detects a hatred for a God of love whom atheists believe to be non-existent! What crass stupidity! One might as well attack green elephants! God has indeed been killed, I am told! He has been dethroned, edged out of His own universe and put onto a Cross, as Bonhoeffer noted! But that was only the beginning of the end! One can, indeed, be a witless atheist, in Oxford, too, and nasty with it! A brave new world, indeed, where tolerance becomes intolerant!
Christians get a lot of stick these days, but most of them are pretty docile, harmless, too pietistic and don’t bite! I wish it were not so, but ecclesiastical realpolitik is with us to stay, at least for the foreseeable future!
But all is not bleak! Christians, of course, will never resort to violence, verbal or otherwise. Those who do are misguided and have departed from biblical Christianity! Christians must out-think, out-live and out-love their opponents! That is a tall order, but the Christian may stand tall and will always thrive in the face of opposition. Perhaps, unwittingly, the ban will attract students to explore the claims of Jesus, the greatest of all controversialists, the paragon of a persecuted minority, since he is the most hated person in the world! I am sure that Pott’s would have banned Jesus, too!
P.S. I now note that there has been a change of mind (Greek metanoia, viz. repentance!) I have started to breathe again - with apologies to Potts and his cohort! Hope uncle Richard won't be too upset, either! Common sense (which is not common) has prevailed - under duress! But one needs to remain vigilant before the vigilantes take over!

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