From: jsalmi@lookout.it.uswc.uswest.com (John Salmi)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Promise Keepers
Date: 21 Aug 92 04:29:01 GMT
Organization: US West Information Technologies, Devner

(Reprinted without permission.  All the typos are mine.  Capitalization takes
 the place of italics.)

Personal commentary:  It's nice to see this fairly liberal newspaper give way
a bit.  This year's Promise Keepers event was held at Folsom Stadium, in
Boulder, Colorado.  Approx 22,500 Christian men attended the event.  The
event was held Friday, July 24th and Saturday, July 25th.  

cheers,

	-john

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From the Boulder (Colorado) Sunday Camera, August 16th, 1992.

	I'm one of the 22,000 who attended the Promise Keepers gathering at
Folsom Stadium.  I hope the few demonstrators weren't too upset at the lack
of hate directed toward them.  We didn't spend any meeting time on political
issues.  Our whole focus was on how to be better men, fathers and husbands.

	That Sunday evening, I listened to a KOA (Denver-based radio station)
radio talk show where the 50,000 watt blowhard took calls about his pet peeve,
Bill McCartney.  His real target was Christianity, but he thought his enemy was
Coach McCartney.  Interestingly, the incoming calls for two hours were about
4 to 1 in favor of McCartney's position.  The host grew tired of being out-
numbered and moved on to another topic, even though the switchboard lit up
like a Christ(there's that word again!)mas tree the whole time.

	McCartney spoke for the last 45 minutes (of 16 hours of fellowship)
with a rallying cry for the "strongest voice in America, the Christian male"
to "take back the country for Christ."  Yes, these are strong words from a
man who has a vision of what God wants him to do.  However, the point of the
gathering was deliberately overlooked by the media, as it did not serve their
agenda very well.

	We were being sharpened by each other and encouraged to take 
responsibility for our choices.  For example, we were chastised on the subject
of welfare mothers raising kids alone ... "Where are the men who fathered
these children?"

	We were challenged to go back to our families and make 22,000 women
very happy to see their changed men.  We were challenged with scripture to
"Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.  Let all
that you do be done in love."

	I ask you, where is the hatemongering and racism in this message? The
answer is obvious: The hate is in those who viciously attack Bill McCartney
for having the guts to stand up before men and be counted as a man who desires
to serve God first, family second, and football third.

	It isn't Bill McCartney who is against homosexuals.  He just agrees
with God that homosexual behavior is a sin.  God used the stronger language,
"an abomination", in the Old Testament.  In the New Testament, in which many
"Christian homosexuals" claim to believe, it says; "Do not be deceived; neither
fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals,
nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers,
shall inherit the Kingdom of God." (1 Corinthians 6:9-10)

	There are other passages that say much the same thing.  Not exactly
good company to be found with, if you want favor from God.

	People who hate Christianity say, "Don't cram your religion down my
throat!"  Well, I feel obligated to remind them that in this country at least,
WE ALSO have the constitutional right to free speech and to participate in our
representative form of government.  We are also directed by our Lord to share
with everyone that God loves them (even homosexuals), but that all people have
a problem with sin and need a savior.

	So, some of us just woke up from a long snooze in the pews while our
country went to Hell in a handbasket!  And we realize that there are just some
issues we just can't keep silent about anymore, because silence is effectively
the same as assent.

	I hear the humanists preaching "tolerance", and they mistakenly
believe that Christ taught "tolerance".  He did not.  He called the legalistic
politicians of His day "whitewashed sepulchers" and "a brood of vipers".  This
did not make the love Him.

	Christ dud, however, preach love, unconditional love, the kind His
Father demonstrated when He sacrificed His own son as a substitutionary payment
for the sons of all who believe.

	This is the message that offends the humanists.  They don't like 
hearing that they are sinners (even though Christians are sinners, too). They
don't even like the concept that there is such a thing as sin.  But TRUTH has
never depended upon what any man thought was true.

	In regard to the media stirring up the anthill over Bill McCartney's
rhetoric, it saddens me that the public has to search so hard to hear both
sides of the moral issues confronting our society today.

	A society so sick when it tries to mainstream homosexuality, while
spewing hate and derision upon it's Christian minority, in the name of 
"tolerance".

	Society is sick when it tolerates 1.5 million babies slaughtered each
year in the name of "a woman's right to choose".  Does ANYONE have the right
to kill like this?

	Society is sick when it makes multi-billion dollar industries out of
pornography, abortion and gambling, while making sure good morals cannot be
taught in the schools in the name of "separation of church and state".  By
the way, where does it say that in the Constitution?

	Finally, I'm asking the men of this country, "WHERE WERE YOU when
thousands of unwed mothers got pregnant and looked for their options?  WHERE
WERE YOU when the pornography moved out of the seedy theaters and into the
corner shopette?  WHERE WERE YOU when your children needed a man to show them
what was right and what was wrong?  Where were you, men?"

	Did you run and hide when your girlfriend said "I'm pregnant"?  Did you
think it was cool to leave a trail of fatherless kids in the wake of your
studliness?  Did you beat up your wife or your kid because they really cramp
your style?  Did you stop loving your wife because she can't hope to measure
up to the babes in those XXX videos?

	We've blown it, men.  We've abdicated our responsibility as leaders
of our families.  WE ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM.  Women see this leadership
vacuum and they try to fill it.  But is this what God had in mind?

	Listen up, you who dislike being preached at.  You get angry because
God's words hit a nerve.  Go ahead and get angry, but keep your ears open. 
There is hope for you.  The "dead" ones don't respond.