Rick Santorum's Presidential Campaign, in Memorium

Rick Santorum withdrew from the Republican Presidential Primary this morning. 

A moment of silence, please..... 

I need to grieve yet another little death of my American idealism and optimism. Once again, as a conservative Christian, my hopes for my beloved country are dashed. I know that, somehow with Rick’s step down, millions of more babies will be murdered in their mother’s womb, our social justice system will become more corrupt, our children will be destined to be raised in a culture of immorality and death. I do not see another candidate who shares my passion for reversing the roots of the problem, only candidates who want to bandage a few of the symptoms.

Rick’s withdrawal from the race seems a symbolic marker in the downward spiral of the U.S. from which I cannot see a possible reversal in my lifetime.

... I didn’t even get to cast a vote for him because I live in North Carolina and the republican primary isn’t until May. 

I am furious at Americans, I am heartbroken for America and yet, amidst all the pain.... in the end, I rejoice as a Christian. 

My Fury at Americans 

This is our fault, citizens. We can't blame the demise of our country on the government when most people do not give enough of a damn to become educated and informed and then go out and vote. We are lukewarm, wretched, miserable, poor, naked and blind Laodiceans. We are foolish, slumbering and unfaithful virgins.

We need to awake and realize that we, as conservative Christians are being manipulated as puppets by our system. The progressives (or should I write “the dark forces” with the anti-life, anti-family, anti-Christian agenda) do everything to split the Christian vote by dividing Christian values between the Democrat and Republican platforms--social justice for the poor on the Democrat side, and life/family issues on the Republican side to make sure we are always fighting against each other. Christian unity is the greatest fear of the progressives.

Then big business and their front group--the politicians--patronize and manipulate the voters by throwing in a couple candidates in the primaries that Christians can get behind to give us the the illusion that we have the freedom of choice. Then the progressives massively fund their candidates and so it appears when the conservatives were beaten, it was all fair and square. 

Then the Presidential race is always between two “moderates” who really have the same agenda, yet whose promises are different enough that we are told, as patriots, we must vote for the lesser of the two evils. And both are so entrenched with the progressives that the winners will bow to DC’s powers as soon as the hand comes off the Bible at their inauguration.

It’s all about money, and we are being played like a stupid but sweet-sounding violin by big business. We are lulled to sleep by the dark forces of propaganda. We are dupes, enslaved by a system that promises freedom, but instead gives us entertainment and inspiring songs of patriotism.

What will it take to awaken us and force us to care? If we look back at history, we will ignore plague after plague and we won’t act until the winds of dark forces sweep through our homes and kill our firstborn.

My Heartbreak for America

Unfortunately, as hard as we try, we will never be able to really fix this. Our problem isn’t that our system is being abused and we need to return to more “freedom.” This is the erroneous premise of the Tea Party. We don’t need more freedom, we need more holiness. The problem is sin. And you can never get where you want to go on the wrong road. You must form your conscience, your life, upon a true premise in order to get to the fullness of Truth. America’s foundation is flawed.

We teach that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are God-given rights. 

Wrong. 

The idea of “God-given rights” is an insidious, pride-producing, mind-warping, intoxicant of Satan to raise up an army of anti-Christs.

Those rights are not in the Bible nor found anywhere in Christian historical teachings. Those are the rights of the arrogant gods of the Enlightenment.

God-given rights are a myth. Freedom to do what we want is a myth. Just on its very surface the premise is obviously false. Look at America. It is  a complete illogical premise that we are wise enough to know what will make us happy (which, by the way, even the pagan Aristotle realized that man hasn’t the ability to achieve happiness when pursuing it).

God never gave us rights--ever. Life is not ours, it is His. He is life and at every breath that blessing is a loan that we may do His will, not our own pleasure. 

God did not die that we may have the freedom to sin. He died that we may have the freedom to quit sinning. We only have one true right and that is to pursue holiness and a clean heart. And that means we throw our illusion of rights back into the face of the Devil and fall at the foot of the Cross in submission to Him.

All life is His vineyard and we are merely stewards of that vineyard. Everything is God’s and we have no intrinsic rights to any of it. We are gifted and honored to be guardians, protectors of God’s garden. He entrusts us with the responsibility to cultivate what is His and bear fruit for His glory.

We will only know joy and freedom when we let go of the idea of “rights” and pursue the Kingdom of heaven with all our hearts. 


(Note of clarification: I am speaking of the relationship of rights between man and God. I believe you can make a case for civil religious liberty for humans based upon charity and extending the golden rule, but that is a man to man relationship.)  

Rejoicing as a Christians

In America’s cultural river rapids we Christians are attempting to maneuver through, many of us are horrified to see right ahead a cloud of spray and a deafening roar. We know what that means.... a huge waterfall lay ahead and if we do not all pull together and reverse our course we are going to plunge headfirst to our nation’s death. 

Our family gave sacrificially to Rick Santorum's campaign. We prayed fervently for him and his family. We hoped that his presidency would put pressure on America’s bleeding economy, the government’s financial irresponsibility and unconstrained debt. We saw him as actively fighting our culture of death and corruption.  

Praying and grieving at mass this morning, the Lord gave me reason to rejoice. He has not abandon us. In fact, America’s suicidal launch into wanton depravity is a controlled fall--because God is still in charge and He is still merciful.

Out of love, He is allowing us to see the fruits of our choices. The problem is that we pray for miraculous interference in order that we do not have to experience the consequences of our passivity, our desire for comfort and bounty. In the end, Christianity becomes confused and broken. For true joy and freedom God wants us to be unified by effort and struggle. This cannot happen when we are not allowed to see the fruits of our choices.

Humans must eat the fruits of our choices. We must learn that what we sew we will reap. God is not withdrawing His blessings and mercy to harm us but that we may see sin and its destruction. It is for our eternal education. He is calling us to repent.

What are we supposed to be seeing?

God is showing us that in a global, historical perspective, all human government will fail. Sin has made us unable to successfully rule ourselves and our fellow man. Autonomy fails, anarchy fails, independence fails, self-rule fails--secular governments of dictators, republics, democracies, socialism, communism, oligarchies--all fail. Theocracies and dynasties and monarchies based in wrong gods also fail.  No matter how sincerely and intelligently begun--all eventually enslave.

God is patiently waiting for us to feel the utter failure of our best human effort at government and under our own oppressive strangle, cry “uncle.” Actually, until we cry, "Abba Father, Thy will be done." We are being brought to our knees into our own personal and corporate Gethsemane. 

He knows we need to discover that in the end, we do not wish for self-governance and autonomy. We will cry out for his Iron Rule and His Kingdom come, His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.