What Duty?

Pat Buchanan looks at the Dobson-Obama flap, and thinks Dobson makes a couple of good points. "At issue: What is Christian truth? Does the true Christian put social peace ahead of his duty to make God’s Law man’s law?"

Indeed, Obama celebrates the Underground Railroad and the abolitionists who, to end slavery, took us over the brink into Civil War. He invokes the defiant marchers of Selma Bridge and Dr. King, who chose confrontation and tore the nation asunder rather than see segregation endure.

Obama, however, is now preaching a kumbaya Christianity where leaders who believe abortion is the killing of the innocent unborn are to set their convictions and cause aside in the name of ecumenical amity.

But what is this "duty" to make "God's Law man's law?" Is it a law to love another, or a law to sow discord and conflict in order to object to the choices other people make? Did Dr. King have a "duty" to call for unprecedented federal intervention in property rights and freedom of association? Does Christian A have a duty to force racist B to kinder to minority C? Or should A just love B and C and do unto them as he would do unto himself?

Does Dr. Dobson have a "duty" to criminalize the killing of the unborn? And if this is accomplished in the U.S.A., do we then have a "duty" to save the unborn in Canada? In China? Why not? A few months ago I was told by a friend that she was pregnant. Even at ninth months it was hardly noticeable. What if she had a miscarriage months before, and never told anyone? It wouldn't have made a difference to anyone else, any more than every time she had sex and didn't conceive. What then would have been the difference to the rest of us if she had an abortion (not that this friend ever would)? To what lengths is The State supposed to go to make sure abortions don't happen, or to prosecute those who perform or procure them?

Frankly, I think social peace is often underrated.