Replacing the Ten Commandments is nothing new. Of recent and notable attempts to do away with them include the efforts by billionaire media mogul Ted Turner. As an atheist who is personally offended by the Ten Commandments, he has, as far back as 1988 at the National Press Association, suggested replacing the Ten Commandments with “Ten Voluntary Initiatives,” referred to by many as The Ted Commandments.
Turner claims that with the Ten Commandments “we’re living with outmoded rules, and nobody even pays much attention to ’em, because they are too old. When Moses went up on the mountain, there were no nuclear weapons, there was no poverty. Today, the commandments wouldn’t go over. Nobody around likes to be commanded.”
Some of his ideas are good ones, like helping the downtrodden, and caring for the planet. I can't go along with #3 though, "to limit families to two children...", I don't want anyone telling me how many children my wife and I can have.
Do people really believe that laws against murder (commandment #6), theft (#8), and perjury (#9) are “outmoded rules”? It seems to me that if people don’t follow the Ten Commandments--if they don't like to be "commanded", or to abide by "outdated rules", they are not likely to live under anyone's proposed substitutes.
and #10, "to support the United Nations" may not always be a good idea if we value national sovereignty and independence. Of course, a “voluntary initiative” is not enforceable, and, therefore, is not a law. Not yet, anyway.
Enter The Ark of Hope. Like the ancient Ark of the Covenant that contained the stone tablets upon which were engraved the Ten Commandments, this ark contains a document that some hope will have greater-reaching influence than the Ten Commandments have.
In fact, Former Soviet Premier and President of the International Green Cross, Mikhail Gorbachev, who also co-chairs the Earth Charter Commission, is quoted as saying, "Do not do unto the environment of others what you do not want done to your own environment....My hope is that this charter will be a kind of Ten Commandments, a 'Sermon on the Mount', that provides a guide for human behavior toward the environment in the next century.”
Maurice Strong, a founding co-chairman of the Earth Charter Commission and advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan concurred, “The real goal of the Earth Charter is that it will in fact become like the Ten Commandments.”
Back in 2000, Shafer Parker wrote an article observing:
"The UN is pursuing global peace, even if it has to start a global religion to get it. If prevention of world wars is the standard by which international peace organizations are judged, then the United Nations has been a smashing success, especially when compared to its hapless predecessor, the League of Nations. But by any lesser measure, the UN has failed. Despite an alphabet soup of committees, organizations and commissions striving for the betterment of mankind over 80 at last count the world seems no closer than it ever was to achieving universal peace and prosperity. More than 100 armed conflicts have erupted in over 70 locations during the last decade alone. And since the Second World War ended in 1945, more than 27 million people have lost their lives in various wars. Nevertheless, the UN has not given up searching for the magic formula. For most of the latter half of the 20th century, UN operatives argued that peace would arrive with the eradication of poverty and a reduction of the birth rate in Third-World countries. Now they have added a third ingredient to the mix: religion".
A singular, world-wide religion. Hmmm. Seems like I've read something about that before...oh yeah, in the Book of Revelation, predictions of events leading up to the End of Time. One-world government, One-world religion, One-world Leader. Hmmm...
Sunday, December 2, 2007
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1 comment:
You've made some excellent observations in this article. I agree when you say that anyone opposed to "commandments" isn't going to abide by these initiatives either.
If the UN is really pushing towards a global religion, as Shafer Parker states, then that worries me, too. I love the idea of having world peace and I think it's a shame that we can't all unite and get along, but any mention of "one world" reminds me of scriptural prophecy. Also, I'm not sure we want to give one person or one governmental body that much control, as there's bound to be abuse at some point.
I think the UN is great at humanitarian efforts, but worthless at preventing war. I seriously doubt they will have any significant impact on religions belief either.
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