Yeah, so, if you haven’t heard, apparently the new favorite hobby of scumbags in New York is a combination of home-invasions and then making claims to squatter’s rights to try to seize property from its rightful owners. Which is, of course, the kind of behavior engaged in during a literal conquest. Seizing property by force and refusing to return it to its rightful owner is conquest, plain and simple. And whatever you want to say about conquest in its historical context, one thing is clear and that is that the conquered people typically don’t like it all that well. Whether there ever is a moral justification for conquest or not is not at issue right now. I will say that the number of times conquest is morally justifiable is far smaller than the number of times conquest has been done in human history, but getting into the exact and specific circumstances and situations wherein conquest is morally justifiable is beyond the scope of this episode.
But, again, that’s not really what matters. What matters is NOT that there are people invading our country and people invading homes and trying to simply conquer. If you didn’t think that a large proportion of those illegally immigrating were not attempting to colonize and thereby conquer, then you’re a fool. That IS what’s happening. This is an invasion. And it is obviously manifesting in conquest.
But, again, it’s NOT the invasion that matters. And it’s not the colonization or the conquest. And it’s not even the home invasions. Yes, obviously those things matter. Obviously, those are things that are bad. But that’s not what matters.
What matters is the fact that it seems like governments and police forces have no interest in putting a stop to it—that in New York you can literally walk into someone’s home when it isn’t occupied and claim it and the police will refuse to evict you! And for many this is shocking. But it isn’t actually shocking. At least it shouldn’t be. If you have been paying attention it shouldn’t surprise you in the least. When the government says it’s OK for mothers to murder their babies, and that it’s ok to mutilate the genitals of children, and that parents can have their children taken from them for refusing to say that boys can become girls, in such a world, is it shocking that private property rights aren’t protected?!
If the government gives aid and comfort to those who wish to violate your rights to life, why would that same government not give aid and comfort to those who wish to violate your right to property?! The right to life is greater and prior to the right to property. If your right to life is alienable, then so is your right to property.
Or, let me put it another way. If the right to life is the greatest right which is prior to all other rights, then any government which will violate the right to life will not protect any other right. The rights to life, liberty, and property are the foundation of our Constitution, and the entire legal tradition.
This government-sponsored tyranny of invaders over citizens is the necessary result of a social and political order which makes mothers into murderers. You cannot preserve the rights to liberty and property if the right to life is not secure. If you cannot protect a child in the womb, you cannot respect borders. It is impossible. You either will let anyone in or you’ll go and invade. But borders mean nothing to those who kill babies because property rights mean nothing to them because the right to life means nothing to them.
For some reason people have gotten the notion that the rights and freedoms we enjoy are a buffet or a la carte menu where we can pick which ones we like and decline the ones we don’t want. But that’s stupid. And it’s not the way it works. The rights laid out in the Constitution: life; liberty; property—these are a package deal. They come bundled.
But maybe that’s the wrong way to think about it. Rather than thinking about rights as a lot of individual freedoms that we have that our Constitution wraps up in one document, I think that it would be better to say that God gives human beings dignity because we are made in His image and that dignity is a package deal. And individual rights, such as life, liberty, and property are subsets of that dignity which we possess as creatures made in the image of God. And that means that to violate ONE of the rights is not to simply select one right among many, but to violate human dignity as a whole. Now, I grant that within this concept there are rights that are greater than others, certainly. And that’s logically necessary. The right to life precedes the right to liberty which precedes the right to property. You can’t enjoy liberty or property without life. And you cannot enjoy the right to property without liberty. But just because some rights are prior to others DOES NOT mean that a violation of the right to property does not violate the dignity of the individual made in the image of God. It does. It simply is not as great a violation as the violation of life.
And we see this in practice. There are people who will steal from pettycash or who will pick your pocket but who wouldn’t kidnap someone. There are people who will steal a car but who won’t commit rape. But rarely does it go the other way. People who will commit coldblooded murder are probably willing to do just about anything. Now, I grant, personal morality is strange. Hitler liked dogs. People’s moral compass can have oddities about it. So, I’m not saying that EVERY murderer would also be willing to commit rape, or kidnapping, or torture, or anything else. All I’m saying is that the history of war demonstrates that if men will kill they will do anything. If you will violate someone’s right to life, it is very likely that there is no right you are unwilling to violate. Again, people at the individual level are unpredictable, I’m sure there are exceptions. But as a rule, this is how it is.
So, if you’re surprised that New York isn’t fighting for the rights of homeowners, my question is: why? Why are you surprised? Did you honestly think that the state that encourages the murder and dismemberment of babies and the mutilation of children would really give a crap about your cape cod in Queens? If you did then more fool you!
But you know, it’s almost as if there were a book that talked about this kind of stuff…
20 And God spoke all these words:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
13 “You shall not murder.
14 “You shall not commit adultery.
15 “You shall not steal.
16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
God gives us these commandments. And I think that there’s a case to be made that they are arranged in order of importance. Or, perhaps that each law is morally prior to those which follow. Think about it this way. It’s POSSIBLE that you can be jealous of your neighbor’s car and not commit adultery. But it’s impossible to commit adultery without coveting. You can steal without being a murderer, but you cannot murder without taking that which does not belong to you. You can lie without cursing your parents, but you cannot curse your parents without believing the lie that you have no moral obligation to honor them.
Now, you might say, but Luke, I think you’re just playing with words here. Or, perhaps you’re thinking, but Luke, I thought you said that we are not under the law of Moses, but the law of Christ which is the law of love. Or, but Luke, I thought you said that the Sabbath Law is no longer valid.
Those are fair points. And while I don’t think that I’m just engaging in wordplay, I can see how someone MIGHT make that argument. And that’s where the debate would occur. But just because I don’t believe we are bound by the Law of Moses doesn’t mean that there wasn’t an inherent prioritized logic.
If you will violate the express command of God to refrain for self-interestedness and greed and self-indulgence (which is why you would violate the Sabbath was, in fact, because you were willing to disobey God to please yourself) then you’ll do all the other things listed on the list.
It’s the same argument as eating the fruit. I don’t think that there was anything inherently immoral about eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The sin was the disobedience, not the act per se. The tree was good and its fruit was good and knowledge is good. Disobedience is bad. And look at the fruit of eating that fruit—mankind has been cast into moral insanity and idiocy; we perpetrate evil, all because we committed a malum prohibitum sin, not a malum in se sin. Or, in other words, the sin that brought murder, rape, kidnapping, home invasion, torture, child molestation, fraud, blackmail, witchcraft, abuse, and all other manner of evil in the world, the sin that did that was simply disobeying the command to not do something that was otherwise good. Which is why I say that the Sabbath Law is logically and morally prior to the law against murder.
Reasonable minds can disagree. I have good and wise friends who say that I’m wrong about this—little do they know that they’re wrong! But we’re still friends and I still respect them.
But here’s what is not up for debate. Whether or not I’m right about the right to life being logically and morally prior to the rights to liberty and property (and I AM right, by the way) but regardless of whether or not I’m right (and I am) it is irrefutable that all this is happening because we refuse to recognize our neighbors as made in the image of God and bearing inherent dignity. The State of New York has forgotten and that’s why the State of New York actively encourages, aids, abets, and commits violations of people’s rights to life, liberty, and property.
But this is what happens everywhere, always, and by everyone who forgets God.
We’ve sown the wind and now we’re reaping the whirlwind. I pray that we remember God and we repent, because these, I fear, are just the beginnings of what’s in store for us. And nobody will come to our rescue. There is no one to help. No mighty army will deliver us from our own self-destruction. May God have mercy on us and may we repent before it’s too late.