The Magna Carta and Religious Liberty

Current Events, History, , ,

Today is the 800th anniversary of the signing of the Magna Carta–considered by many to be the founding document of the concept of the rule of law. But an important aspect of the document’s history is being overlooked: The role the church played in its drafting.

Writing at Breakpoint, Eric Metaxas says,

“With the disagreement threatening to turn into a civil war, the Archbishop of Canterbury, working as an intermediary between the King [of England] and the barons, helped to draft a proposed charter that would settle the dispute. . . .

“Since then, virtually every opponent of despotism and tyranny in the English-speaking world has drawn inspiration from the Magna Carta, which declared, ‘To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay, right or justice.’ When the Founding Fathers complained about ‘taxation without representation,’ they were appealing to the Magna Carta.”

Listen to Metaxas’ full commentary below to learn more about this document and what it has to do with liberty today.

[audio:http://www.breakpoint.org/images/content/breakpoint/audio/2015/061515_BP.mp3]

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The Battle Is the LORD’s

Marriage, Religious Freedom, ,

The following blog post is by Family Council staff member Deborah Beuerman.

David was a young boy whose task it was to tend his father’s sheep.  His older brothers usually were in the field with him, but they had been called to fight the war with the Philistines.  The word from the battle front was that things were not going well for King Saul’s army.  The enemy had a secret weapon—a giant man—who intimidated and daily challenged his opponents to send one man to fight him.  The Israelites trembled in fear and no man would step forward to what they all assumed to be death.

Jesse was concerned about his sons and sent David to take them food and find out how they were faring.  David was there to hear the daily taunting from the giant, Goliath, and was amazed saying, “who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?”  David went to Saul and volunteered to fight Goliath.  He took his staff and put five smooth stones in his shepherd’s pouch and went out toward Goliath with his sling shot in his hand.

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Obama Administration Poised to Silence Political Opponents

Current Events,

The IRS is proposing new regulations giving themselves more authority to restrict nonprofit groups.

For the first time, the IRS wants to define “candidate-related political activity” to include projects such as voter guides, legislative scorecards or reporting voting records of elected officials, get-out-the-vote campaigns, promotion of voter registration, or even mentioning the names of candidates who are running for office. Any “candidate-related political activity” could jeopardize a group’s nonprofit status.

These new proposed rules are significant, because they affect organizations’ ability to engage in issue advocacy and basic political speech.

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