Not All Evangelicals Support Censorship

An editorial on the Christian Examiner website urges evangelical Christians to think very carefully before embracing measures to regulate media. The article reminds its readers that what goes around, comes around...

...Overzealous political activism poses a threat to the fundamental task of the church: proclamation of the gospel. Many criticize the relief efforts of nominally Christian groups, such as the National Council of Churches, which divorce evangelism and charitable work. But where Christians rightly decry such inconsistency in other quarters, we should also beware the temptation elsewhere to confuse or obscure the fulfillment of the Great Commission...

Today perhaps the antics of a Howard Stern will be outlawed by increased governmental regulation. But tomorrow it may be that simply reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans will be prohibited as hate speech, indecent or otherwise intolerant. We have already seen threats of this in other countries. In the words of Jesus, “All who draw the sword will die by the sword” (Matthew 26:52 NIV). Zealous Christian activism in the area of speech limitation carries within it the possibility for governmental incursion into the realm of the church itself.

If nothing else, the editorial shows that evangelicals don't speak with one voice on such matters, and that, more so than many of us realize, they support free speech, even when they don't endorse the content of that speech.

Source: BuzzMachine