talkpolitics | What God thought about civil rights in the 1960s:

underlankers.livejournal.com posting in

I find it interesting given the influence this man had on the modern Christian Right to note what his views were on the "universal brotherhood of man" and whether or not God's idea of equal rights had or did not have a racial bar.

"If Chief Justice Warren and his associates had known God's word and had desired to do the Lord's will, I am quite confident that the 1954 decision would never have been made," Falwell boomed from above his congregation in Lynchburg. "The facilities should be separate. When God has drawn a line of distinction, we should not attempt to cross that line."

Falwell's jeremiad continued: "The true Negro does not want integration.... He realizes his potential is far better among his own race." Falwell went on to announce that integration "will destroy our race eventually. In one northern city," he warned, "a pastor friend of mine tells me that a couple of opposite race live next door to his church as man and wife."

As pressure from the civil rights movement built during the early 1960s, and President Lyndon Johnson introduced sweeping civil rights legislation, Falwell grew increasingly conspiratorial. He enlisted with J. Edgar Hoover to distribute FBI manufactured propaganda against the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and publicly denounced the 1964 Civil Rights Act as "civil wrongs."

In a 1964 sermon, "Ministers and Marchers," Falwell attacked King as a Communist subversive. After questioning "the sincerity and intentions of some civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mr. James Farmer, and others, who are known to have left-wing associations," Falwell declared, "It is very obvious that the Communists, as they do in all parts of the world, are taking advantage of a tense situation in our land, and are exploiting every incident to bring about violence and bloodshed."

Falwell concluded, "Preachers are not called to be politicians, but soul winners."

http://www.thenation.com/article/agent-intolerance

And a reminder of what Governor Barbour called something that "wasn't so bad" in its own words:

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/images/docpage-citizens_council1.jpg

This reminds me of how the Southern Baptist Convention, where what Alexander Stephens called the "cornerstone" of (Southern) society, "that the white man is superior to the black man" was considered official doctrine into 1995 is suddenly and completely confused as to why anyone could possibly see racism where it is concerned. I'm thus going to ask a simple question, one that probably straddles the idea of religion and politics and also a few other issues: which view of God's will in the 1960s was correct? Martin Luther King's Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory vision where "the descendants of slaves and of slaveowners" are "treated according to the content of their character, not the color of their skin" or Falwell's view that ": "The true Negro does not want integration.... He realizes his potential is far better among his own race."

Whose God is the real God? They both alike see in the same Scriptures two incompatible messages when they are both alike from a Denomination that takes the belief that someone reading the same Bible should come to the one true message God preaches. They also use alike the same Scriptures to condemn each other. Who is the voice of God, and who is not?