Tony Campolo criticized for his stance on Palestinian statehood

Cindy, thanks for EXPOSING the Bad Theology.

Rufus

 

I like Tony. His books, "The Kingdom of God is a Party" and "Who Switched the Pricetags" were influential in my early Christian growth, but he does have a bad habit of contorting scripture to fit his liberal ideology.

 

My only concern with th article was that it blasts Tony Campolo for serving as a spiritual counselor to the White House during te Clinton Presidency. No matter who's in the White House, I would hope that any pastor would accept a request from the White House for pastoring. The last time I checked, it wasn't appropriate to "pick and choose" who we pastor to.

Joseph Farah loses a little bit of credibility by including this in his commentary.

 

I lost respect for the man years ago when he came to my college to speak. He was trying to make a point that believers didn't care enough. He did so by using an explitive. He then said that we would probably only remember that he cursed. I remember what he was trying to say before cursing, then I stopped listening to him. What made it worse was I spoke to a friend a year or so later and he delivered the same message with the same curse at her school.

He was there supposedly representing God. In my opinion he didn't do a very good job. Those of us who were believers at that point dismissed everything he had to say. I don't seek relationship advice from someone who is divorced three times over, and I don't look for evangelism advice from someone who can not control his tongue and is cursing just for shock value.

 

I know the message you are referring to...

Sounds like he proved his point with you. Christians today are so caught up with the rules of "proper" Christian circles that they ignore important things like social justice, evangelism and such.

It reminds me of when I was telling about a certain time I lead someone to the Lord. While we prayed together, he expressed his lostness to God in prayer... he told God that his "life was full of useless s*** " that he needed to give up and all of the things he had done were "s***ty". I was talking about how that teenagers prayer was an echo of what Paul said in Phillipians about his religious life and works... Paul considered them "dung" (as "proper" English translations would render it).

But of course, the people I talked to couldn't get over the fact that the teen had used crude language in a heartfelt prayer to God. (I didn't even use the words the teen used when I related the story... I just said "the 'S'-word".)

 

The last time I heard Tony, he sounded more like a socialist than anything else. Get rid of your wealth, you don't need that nice home when so many people are hurting, but I notice he kept his.
Bob

 

It's kind of like the Steve Camp interview in CCM a billion years ago.

He used the word, s***, for the sake of making a point and his points were briliant and the article should have been nailed to the door of every church in America.

Instead, all anyone cared about was that he used the "S" word.

 

Cindy said:

Joseph Farah says Campolo is "misinformed" and espousing "bad theology"

Ransom says Joseph Farah is a whackjob.

Did anyone read his Feb. 7 column? Basically he exploited the Columbia tragedy to rant about how astronaut Kalpana Chawla was an incompetent nitwit who was only allowed into space again because she was a woman and a visible minority.

His "free Clara Harris and give her a medal" diatribe is hilariously absurd, too.

In addition, I don't know how many times I've caught WorldNut Daily repeating some urban legend like it was gospel truth. Farah and his organization have so little credibility, everyone around them becomes stupider just to maintain equilibrium.

 

Is Campolo misinformed? I don't think so. I doubt that ther is anything farah has referred to that Campolo is unaware of. That Campolo simplified history, and stressed some issues over others to make a point is obvious. But Farah does the same thing.

Is Campolo's theology bad? Not in this case. Insisitng on justice for the alien is perfectly in line with the OT prophets.

 

I think Campolo is actually right that many of us shouldn't be caught up in the consumer mentality of the world. That's not socialism, that's the biblical model of the Christian discipline of simplicity.

I also heard the sermon Tony preached using the explitive. I thought he made a good point. We often care more about being PC than we do about issues of Justice.

 

This is the third time I've read something by Joseph Farah. This is the third time I have been, well, less than impressed with him.

 

Tony Campolo has always been a political liberal but theologically conservative. Campolo is right that most American evangelicals forget about Palestians. I think he is wrong about supporting a Palestian state. The Palestians must reform themselves and get leaders who do not condone terrorism. Muslims hurt their own cause by either being mute or supporting Hussein or Bin Ladin and practically all Islamic countries are ruled by despots who starve their people while they live in poverty. Israel on the other hand is a prosperous democracy.

I do not see bad theology in Campolo's speech but I do see a person who is naive or ignorant. It also should be pointed out that Campolo is a pacifist and would oppose any war.

 

Bad theology? This article discusses no bad theology (unless you are a pre-mill/pre-trib. individual who believes that geo-political Israel is the "nation of God" and don't like what Campolo is declaring).

Elsewhere, however, Campolo's bad theology is abundant. He holds to Liberation Theology ("Christian Marxism"). He holds to a lot of other Liberal beliefs as well.

 

Sorry Rev G. but the Early Church had possesions in common, and practiced what we might call a system closer to marxism. Capatalism is not from God. Tony Campolo is smack on the money when he downs Industrial Capatist type ideas which break up families and are quite blatently against Gods standards in the Bible.

It is a real pity to see churches basing themselves on Capatalist type models of a board, and a class system within the fellowship.

I am neither Right Wing nor Left Wing, because both sides lead to somewher you dont want to go. Extreme Left wingers can be advocates of Homosexuality, while Extreme Right wingers can advocate Racism (NAZI, KKK etc). Christians need to be neutral on politics, voting for people who will stand up for Gods word in the government, considering each issue on its merits, Not the current corrupt system of voting for somebodys bill so that they will support yours etc.

Tony Campolo may well be on the Left of Politics, It is no worse than another popular book writer being on the right side of politics both are not Christian sides, this is a man made idea that one side is right on everything and the other wrong. and Christians get sucked into it hook ,line and sinker.

 

Sorry, Ben, in the early church it was voluntary and done out of brotherly love.

Under Socialism it's ultimately at the bad end of a gun barrel.

 

Ben:

Tony Campolo, according to his own assertions, holds to Liberation Theology ("Christian Marxism"). That is simply a fact.

The difference between the Early Church and Marxism is freedom. The members of the Early Church did not abandon their possessions to the collective whole, they sold and gave as people had need. They were not forced to do so, they gave because they loved God and one another. There is a great difference between that and being forced to be "equal."

 

Let us not forget that the Nazis were not to the "Right," but to the "Left." The full title was the National SOCIALIST Party.

 

I know that there are people who really care what Dr. Campolo has to say about major issues, but I am not one of them. On the following link, there's some info about this man and what he stands for.

http://www.vcyamerica.org/issues/page_view.cfm?reportid=2&pageid=5

Roy