How hate speech leads to violence, from someone who knows.

June 1: Frank Schaeffer, author, Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elect, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take All (or Almost All) of it Back” explains to MSNBC’S Rachel Maddow how hateful speech leads to violent acts.

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MSNBC transcript ot that segment below:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O‘REILLY, FOX NEWS HOST: Tiller the baby killer out in Kansas, acquitted—acquitted today of murdering babies. I wanted George Tiller, Tiller the baby killer, going—hey, I can‘t make more money killing babies now. Tiller the baby killer. As “The Factor” has been reporting, this man will terminate fetuses at anytime for $5,000.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What do you think about Dr. George Tiller?

KATHLEEN SEBELIUS, HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: I don‘t think anything about Dr. George Tiller.

O‘REILLY: She doesn‘t seem to be real upset about this guy operating a death mill.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MADDOW: Death mill. That was FOX News host, Bill O‘Reilly then.

During the life of George Tiller, for four years, he repeatedly accused Dr. Tiller of murder, of infanticide. He publicly compared him to everything, from Nazis, to pedophiles, to al Qaeda. He described him as having blood on his hands.

Now that Dr. Tiller has been murdered inside his own church, here is Mr. O‘Reilly tonight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O‘REILLY: Anarchy and vigilantism will ensure the collapse of any society. Once the rule of law breaks down, a country is finished. Thus, clear-thinking Americans should condemn the murder of late-term abortionist, Tiller. Even though the man terminated thousands of pregnancies, what he did is within Kansas law.

The 67-year-old Tiller had performed abortions for more than 35 years. “The Washington Times” estimates he destroyed about 60,000 fetuses. Very few American doctors will perform the operation. None of that seemed to matter to Tiller, nicknamed “the baby killer” by pro-life groups, who stated he was helping women—Tiller stated that.

I report honesty. Every single thing we said about Tiller was true. My analysis was based on those facts. It is clear that the far left is exploiting—exploiting, the death of the doctor. Those vicious individuals want to stifle any criticism of people like Tiller. That and hating FOX News is the real agenda here.

Finally if these people were so compassionate, so very compassionate, so concerned for the rights and welfare of others, maybe they might have written something, one thing, about the 60,000 fetuses who will never become American citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MADDOW: Do you think he‘s sorry that Dr. Tiller is dead?

Mr. O‘Reilly went on to claim he never tried to incite anything, he was just reporting.

Joining us now is Frank Schaeffer, who grew up in the religious far right, who made a documentary anti-abortion film series in the 1970s, and whose latest book is titled, “Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elects, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take All or Almost All of It Back.”

Mr. Schaeffer, thank you very much for your time tonight.

FRANK SCHAEFFER, AUTHOR, “CRAZY FOR GOD”: Thank you for having me on, Rachel.

MADDOW: Today, writing at “Huffington Post,” you apologized, as a former member of the religious right, for what happened to Dr. Tiller. Why did you feel the need to apologize?

SCHAEFFER: Well, words have consequences.

And what we did in the ‘70s and ‘80s, my father, Dr. Francis Schaeffer, Dr. C. Everett Koop, who became Reagan surgeon general, members of the Republican Party who worked with us to make abortion part of the Republican agenda, the Roman Catholic allies that we had in the church, various people—we talked and our talk got more and more extreme, and less and less democratic. Until, finally, my dad actually went so far as to write a book called “A Christian Manifesto,” where he said the use of force to change Roe v. Wade and roll back the law legalizing abortion would be legitimate and he compared Roe and the American government to Hitler‘s Germany in the 1930s.

And when you look at what happened to Dr. Tiller, there‘s a direct line connecting the rhetoric that I was part of as a young man and this murder. And so, people, like me, are responsible for what we said and what we did and the way we raised the temperature on this debate out of all bounds. And so, when O‘Reilly talks about the fact that these people of the far left are against FOX or against him or trying to muzzle the debate, he‘s telling a lie.

I am not a member of the far right—until I voted for Barack Obama in the last election, I am lifelong Republican. I am still pro-life. I also believe abortion should be legal, but I agree with Barack Obama when he says we ought to find ways to help women, help children, give contraceptives, sex education, to lessen the number of abortions. I think abortion is a tragedy.

But I also think that pretending that you can call abortion murder and Tiller the baby killer, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera—and that these worlds don‘ words don‘t have an impact, is crazy.

So, this is what helps unhinge a society, talking like this. And I

was part of that, and that‘s why I apologize—and I would apologize again

I am sorry for what I did.

And I think that people who say extreme things should stand up and take the consequences and admit when they were wrong. And in this case, we were wrong. We were wrong more really. We were wrong politically.

And as a believing Christian, I was wrong in terms of someone who says he follows Jesus Christ.

MADDOW: There are a lot of people in this country, obviously, who are part of the pro-life movement, the legal pro-life movement, and who hold pro-life views and who seek to change the laws of this country about abortion. There‘s obviously what I consider to be a terrorist movement who believes not that the laws should be changed but that the laws should—but that people who are legally engaged in providing abortion services are legitimately targets of violence that they should be intimidated, harassed and in some cases killed.

Those two movements are not the same thing. And it‘s important to me as an American that people who are pro-life feel that they can safely articulate those views and that they are not being attacked for what extremists have done.

SCHAEFFER: Right.

MADDOW: But I also don‘t want to excuse anybody who incites violence, or who, I guess, makes excuses for the violent wing of this movement, that has two very different wings. How do you see the connection there?

SCHAEFFER: Well, you know, the book you mentioned earlier, “Crazy for God,” has a number of chapters talking about the way we took the movement from its early stages when it was more a moral concern, not so much about politics and not so much about changing the law, and radicalized that movement. I follow the step by step process. Secret meetings with Pat Robertson down at the 700 Club, Jerry Falwell sending his jet up to me to bring me down to his church to speak a couple of times.

And what we did is we talked one game to the large public and we talked another game amongst ourselves. And amongst ourselves, we were very radical. And I don‘t think it takes much imagination to guess that, tonight, there are people who are publicly saying, “This is terrible, we never advocated killing, abortion is murder, but we didn‘t mean people to take us this seriously.” But in private, you know, if these folks popped champion bottles, they would be drinking a toast to this murder tonight.

I know that this is the case because of the fact that I was part of the movement, but also understood very well what we were doing back then was to attack the political issue when we talked to people like Ronald Reagan and the Bush family and Jack Kemp—the late Jack Kemp that we were very close to in all this. But on a private side, we also were egging people on to first pick at abortion clinics, then chain themselves to fences, then go to jail.

We knew full well that in a country that had seen the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther king, two Kennedy brothers and others, that what we were also doing was opening a gate here. And I think there‘s no way to duck this. We live in a country in which guns are all over the place. We have plenty of people with a screw loose, plenty of people on the edge. It only takes one.

And what scare me is that I see the rhetoric of the Republican Party right now—including the former vice president—about our newly elected African-American president has the same sort of coded stuff in it. He‘s not a real American. He‘s making America less safe. He‘s a secret Muslim. Some Christians in the same groups that are pro-life groups are running around saying he‘s the anti-Christ.

They also know full well that we have people out there who will take it to the next step and say, “Well, gee, if he‘s the anti-Christ, if he‘s anti-American, if he‘s a communist, maybe the best thing we can do is pull another trigger some other day.”

We live in a country where people get killed for their views sometimes. We‘re a very divided nation coming out of this culture war.

It is irresponsible for people to make these wild statements—like Bill O‘Reilly does—and then step back after it happens and say, “Oh, I never meant that.” Yes, they did mean it. They meant exactly what they said.

And when you start calling people those sorts of names—the way I did back in the ‘70s and the early ‘80s—for which I am apologizing today, not just because of this but other incidents like this, if people don‘t stand up and actually take back these words, take back these angry word, they are still culpable for the next event that happens. And we need to be able to just call it what it is.

MADDOW: Frank Schaeffer is author of the book, “Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elects, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take All or Almost All of It Back”—Mr. Schaeffer, it‘s just bracing testimony from you tonight. Thanks for—thanks for being here on the show.

SCHAEFFER: Thanks for having me on.

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Exodus Youth: Truth and Tolerance transcript

This is a partial transcript of the Exodus Youth DVD called "Truth and Tolerance."

Below is Alan Chambers' introduction, and the Scott Davis portion on Biblical perspectives:

Alan Chambers: The issue of homosexuality is being talked about in our culture. If students don’t learn about it at home, and they don’t learn about it at church, they’re going to learn about it on MTV, or from a guidance counselor, or from a peer, who may not have the Biblical understanding of this issue like you do.

I want to thank you for being bold, and I want to challenge you to continue to do so. What you offer students is critical. They have to know the truth about homosexuality from God’s perspective.

Truth and Tolerance is a series that was created under the leadership of Scott Davis and Exodus Student Ministries. It’s excellent, and something that I encourage you to use as you talk about the issue of homosexuality from God’s perspective, with those under your care. Be bold.

Thank you so much for taking the opportunity to do this.

Biblical perspectives on homosexuality.
Scott Davis, Student Ministries Director, Exodus International: When it comes to homosexuality, there are so many perspectives out there, it’s really hard to know what to think. Even when we just look at what Scripture says on the issue of homosexuality, some people are saying one thing, while others are saying the exact opposite. Some folks with tell you that Scripture says that homosexuality is wrong, it’s not God’s design for sexuality, while other people will tell you that, well Scripture really say that, it says something a little bit different, it isn’t really talking about homosexuality.

It’s difficult to know what to think. And often we’ll just jump into specific verses that mention homosexuality, and we’ll argue over nuances and little phrases and Greek words, and it’s very difficult to get our hands around. The surprising thing is that often we’ll get into these arguments on specific verses without even being sure whether we all understand what we mean by Scripture in the first place.

For instance, often we’ll argue about what a particular Biblical author meant in a specific verse, without even necessarily believing that Scripture is even God’s word, or even something that we need to follow. So it’s important that the first step in talking about Biblical perspectives on homosexuality, to first talk about our foundations. What are our foundational beliefs that guide how we’re going to think and talk about this particular topic. Because that’s going to determine to a large extent, what we’re going to end up believing about homosexuality. So, to be completely up front and honest with you, I want to tell you what my foundational beliefs are, and we’ll build from there.

Belief in a Good Creator
My first belief is that there is a good creator. What I believe is that God made the Earth and made human beings in a great and beautiful and wonderful way. God is a good creator, and so we can expect that His creation is good. And we out to be able to learn about God, from how He made the world. We out to be able to learn about how He wants us to live our lives from how He created our bodies. How He designed sexuality for instance.

Basic Christian Beliefs
Then, on top of that belief in a good creator, I also hold to basic Christian beliefs. I’m not talking about a specific stance on Scripture or Bible verses at this point, but simply the basic Christian beliefs of the Gospel message of Jesus Christ. The message that says that although God created the world good, we’ve rebelled against him, we’re in need of a savior. And Jesus Christ is that savior.

Bible is a Truthful Authority
My third foundation is that the Bible is a truthful authority. The Bible is truthful, and by that I mean that it is not inaccurate, it’s not in error, the Bible isn’t lying to us. And also that the Bible is our authority. And it’s an authority in our lives because it’s not just what some men thought about God, or about how we ought to live our lives, but the Bible is actually God’s word. He has revealed to us how He’s made us and how He wants us to live. He’s revealed to us what kind of God he is, and told us about his love for us.

~~~
Belief in a Good Creator
And so these are my foundational beliefs. So let’s start, just with my first belief here, that there is a good creator. Maybe you and I don’t necessarily agree on basic Christian beliefs, but we can agree that there is a good creator who has made us. If we look at that, what can we learn on the topic of homosexuality? Well, if there is a good creator, then that means we ought to be able to look at our world, how God has made us, and learn something about how we ought to live.

Purpose of Sexuality
So we can look at sexuality specifically and we can see that there’s a primary purpose in sexuality, that sexuality is a means of procreation, of making children. Now this is something very obvious. Sexuality isn’t just about pleasures and just about a husband and wife enjoying each other, or two people who love each other, having some pleasure together. Sexuality is primarily a means of procreation.

And so homosexual sex can never fulfill the primary purpose of sexuality. And we see that that ought to teach us something about how we have to think about homosexuality - that it goes contrary to the very nature of sexual acts.

Biology of Sexuality
Second we can look at biology. Male and female sexual organs were designed to go together. Homosexual sex ignores the obvious use of the sexual organs.

So if we believe together that there’s a good god who’s made us, who’s made our bodies, as male and female, both of them good. And we look at the sexual organs and see how they’re designed for each other, we can understand that sexuality is designed for male and female. Not for two males or for two females.

So simply on the basis of the belief in a good creator, without even a belief in Christianity, we should be able to agree, based on the purpose of sexuality, and based on our sexual organs, that heterosexuality seems to be the intended design of sexuality.

The Christian Story
But now let’s look at the second foundational belief, what I would call basic Christian beliefs. Without arguing over any specific verses at all, what can we learn about homosexuality? Well first of all, let’s look at the basic Christian story, the Gospel message. This the message of Christ that all Christians believe, that holds that although the world was created good, we’ve fallen in rebellion against God, and our desires that originally were good, are now turned and twisted away from God, they lead into temptation and sin, and all kinds of wickedness if we follow after them. But in Christ our redeemer we can be transformed and forgiven of all of all of our sins, and given new desires that follow after God’s, so we can be remade in the image of God.

Now, let’s look at the pro-gay message. The pro-gay message says that these desires that you might experience, of homosexuality or other desires, that you need to fulfill those desires, to pursue them actively in order to find a good life. But this runs directly contrary to the Christian Gospel, which says that many of the desires in our hearts are deceitful and wicked, and we need to deny those desires, and be transformed by God to desire instead, what He wants for our lives. Which is revealed clearly in Scripture. And so, based on this, we can see that pro-gay theology is directly contrary to the basic Christian message.

Church History
Next let’s look at church history. We can look at the history of the church and of the Jewish synagogue, before the church existed, and see that throughout 4000 years of history of God’s people, it’s only this tiniest little last moment of history that anyone in the church has suggested that homosexuality is good, and right, and normal. For 4000 years, the followers of God have understood that homosexuality is not God’s design for sexuality. And yet now we want to redefine what God says, as if we are somehow much more wise and knowledgeable than every single believer who’s come before us for 4000 years. I think that an incredibly arrogant step to make if we make that quickly.

The Bible
Next we can look at the Bible. Not any one or two or three specific verses, but the entirety of scripture, and see, well what does God say about sexuality, just in general. And we can look and see that from start to finish, in every book of the Bible, that God describes and reveals His design of sexuality as to be between a man and a woman in a marriage relationship.

So we can start in the first chapter of the Bible in the book of Genesis, where it says, God created men in His own image. In the image of God he created them---male and female He created them. And He told them to multiply and fill the whole Earth. And obviously it was going to take a lot of sex for them to multiply, and fill the whole Earth. And so sex and gender were God’s good and beautiful design, it was His intention.

In the second chapter of Genesis, the second chapter in the whole Bible, God brings man and woman together, and then Scripture says, it’s for this reason that man will leave his father and mother and be joined with his wife, and they’ll become one flesh, and it’s talking about sex. God designed sex, and He brought man and woman together. This was His design and His purpose. And from that starting point and through the end of the last book of the Bible, every book talks about sexuality. And since it’s always talked about, it ought to be between a husband and a wife in marriage, this is God’s design. There’s no other place within Scripture that promotes any other use of sexuality, whether it’s premarital sex, or homosexual sex, or any kind of sexual expression outside of a husband and a wife. This is very clearly God’s design for sex.

The Bible 2
Now what about homosexuality specifically, again, without looking at any specific verses, we can look and we can see that there’s not a single positive verse in the entirety of Scripture that talks positively about homosexuality. Homosexuality was definitely known in the ancient world, It was practiced by the nations around the nation of Israel, it was practiced by the Romans surrounding the early Christian Church, this was something they knew and understood, and yet Scripture never speaks positively of homosexuality. If this was something that was good and natural, that God desired for his people, you would surely expect to find a hint, at least somewhere, that homosexuality was good, and yet we don’t find that.

And so based simply on this basic belief that there’s a good creator, and the basic belief, and the basic Gospel, the Christian message, we find some very strong evidence that homosexuality is not what God designed people for.

Bible is a Truthful Authority
But now let’s further. Maybe you’ve followed me this far, and maybe you can take the next step with me to my final foundational belief here, that the Bible is a truthful authority. Not only is Christianity true, but the Bible itself is true, and it holds authority over our lives, and so, it’s worthwhile to look at some specific verses that mention homosexuality, and see what God has to say there.

Leviticus 20:13
First we can look in Leviticus chapter 20 verse 13. It says: “If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, what they have done is detestable.” Now it is talking about--very straight forward way, is sex between a man and woman. A man lying with a man as one lies with a woman. And it says that the act is detestable, not that the people are detestable to God, but the act is detestable. And it’s detestable to God because it goes against his very design of how He created male and female to live.

The rest of the chapter of Leviticus 20 talks about all kinds of other illegitimate expressions of our sexuality. For instance, having sex with your mom, having sex with your sister, sex with animals, all kinds of other expression of sexuality. Each of these are prohibited as not being God’s design for sex.

Romans 1:26-27
But then let’s look at the New Testament. What does the New Testament have to say about sexuality? Well we should look first in Romans chapter 1, and this is a verse, or rather a chapter, where Paul is at an argument where, really all of mankind has turned against God. This isn’t about pointing fingers at one particular person, or at a group of people, or pointing a finger at gays, certainly that’s not what this is about, this is about what all of mankind has done. Paul builds this argument, showing how we have turned against God, we’ve rebelled against his design for us in every conceivable way. We were made to worship God, we’ve exchanged that for worshiping other things. We were made for heterosexual relationships, we exchanged that for homosexual relationships.

Romans 1 verse 26 through 27 says this: “Even the women turned against the natural way to have sex, and instead indulged in sex with each other. And the men, instead of having normal sexual relationships with women, burned with lust for each other. Men did shameful things with other men and, as a result, suffered within themselves the penalty they so richly deserved.” And what Paul talks about here is this fallen world that we live in---how mankind has just completely rebelled against God, we’ve turned away from him in order to live in our own ways.

Each of us things that the way that we want to live is the best way for us to live. And we’ll find life if we reject God’s design, or what He tells us about how we ought to live, and live in our own way instead. The Scripture says there that we, although we claim we’re wise, we’ve become fools. We’ve become darkened in our minds, we become foolish, we loose all understanding. This is the result that all of mankind is under, and as we look around at our world, this shouldn’t be surprising when we see this explained in Scripture. because we look around at our world, and we see that whatever God says we ought to do, the world says don’t do. Whatever God says don’t do, the world says this is what you should do. And what the world says, leads to death.

1 Corinthians 6:9-11
Now, there’s another passage in Scripture that talks about homosexuality that’s really important. And this is First Corinthians 6, verse 9 through 11. It says: “…Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders…will in inherit the kingdom of God.” And I’ll pause there for a moment. I want you to know here that, it isn’t just homosexuality that’s singled out, he’s singling out all kinds of ways of living outside of God’s design for how He wants us to live. And these are things that separate us from God, that divide us from Him and lead to death if we don’t reject those things and turn back towards Him. All of us certainly struggle with sin at times in our lives, but this about living a life of rebellion, turned away from God and living after those things that we desire more than Him.

Now the verse goes on from here, and it says this: “And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”

And so right here, there’s 2000 year old evidence that in the first generation of the Christian Church, there were men and women who had left homosexuality. In order to follow Jesus, they’d been washed, they’d been cleansed, and they found a new life in Christ. And this is the same promise that is there for all of us. We can be washed and cleansed if we turn from our sins to follow after God.

So if we turn back to our foundations here, we can look first of all at the foundation of the good creator who’s made us and see that there’s a purpose to sexuality, that can’t be fulfilled in homosexuality. That there is a design of male and female sexual organs for another (sic) that obviously isn’t expressed in homosexual sex. Then we can look at basic Christian understanding and see that pro-gay theology is opposed to the basic Gospel message. We can see that throughout 4000 years of Church history has never approved of homosexuality, except for some in our own day who are trying to overturn that. We can see that throughout scripture from start to finish, only marriage between a man and a woman is the only place where sexuality is meant to be expressed, and we see that Scripture never promotes homosexuality.

And finally we look at this taught foundation, a Bible as a truthful authority, and we see what Scripture has to say specifically on the issue of homosexuality. And here we see that male and female were made in God’s image, and meant to multiply. We see that homosexuality is expressly prohibited in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. We see that in Paul’s argument in Romans 1, homosexuality kind of exemplifies His argument that all of mankind is rebelled against God, turned against what we were designed for to live in other kinds of ways, and kind of fool ourselves into believing this is how we should live.

The simple truth is that God designed male and female in his own image. He created sexuality to be between a husband and a wife, and every other sexuality and identity and expression and behavior, is outside of his purpose there. And God’s call to holiness and His promise of redemption is for all people, including that person who struggles with homosexuality.

Conclusion
The topic of homosexuality is so controversial, that often it seems easier to just not have any opinion on the topic. But as Christians we need to learn to stand firm on God’s truth, and not be ashamed of what Scripture has to say. For many of you, what I’ve shared has confirmed what you already believe about God’s Biblical standards of sexuality. I hope you’ve seen that you don’t need to be ashamed of believing that. That even when we look outside of Scripture, to nature and our own bodies, we see that what God says about homosexuality is confirmed in the world.

But for many of you, what I’ve shared may have been very hard to hear to hear. Because if it’s true that homosexual behavior is wrong, that means, that means that the lifestyle that you’re good friend or your mom or your brother is living, isn’t pleasing to God. It and may mean in your own life, that the gay relationships you’re following, are not pleasing to him either. You may think that in order to live a happy and fulfilled life, you need to pursue homosexuality. But God doesn’t give a standard for sexuality just to ruin our fun, or to keep us from living a fulfilled life. God is our creator, and He has designed us, and He knows what’s best for us. He has made our souls, our bodies, even our sexuality. God really is worth trusting. Will you listen to Him, are you willing to listen and hear what God has to say? God loves you, and He really is worth trusting, even when what He has to say is hard for us to hear.

Thank you for listening.

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