Pastor Gary wrote:Dale wrote:The Confederate Battle flag is everything you make it. You and I both know that often times that flag was flown, not in its traditional sense of states' rights, but for racist reasons. It is flown as the Klan demonstrates in the streets. For that reason I understand why some call it a racist symbol. But I also understand that it is part of my heritage.
Yeah, the old Stars & Bars is a lightning rod symbol. I grew up in Alabama and graduated from Butler High School -- the REBELS. Confederate flags, Dixie, that little pot-bellied rebel soldier character... and we had black football players, black cheerleaders, black kids jumping and yelling hooray when Dixie was played for every touchdown. Nothing racial in it there, just a symbol of heritage and regional pride.
Flash forward: Now I live 5,000 miles west of Alabama and pastor quite a few black people (along with pretty much every shade of brown, yellow and pink) and am sensitive to their feelings and what that same symbol means to them. It is a different time and place. While I can see that flag as a friendly reminder of my southern heritage, some of them may see it as a symbol of "the bad old days" of Jim Crow, Bull Conner and the fire hoses, a bus burned in Anniston on its way to Selma... I love these folks far more than I love any heritage symbols, and -- even though my motives might be pure -- I would never display the Stars and Bars so as not to hurt my Brothers and Sisters in Christ who might not see it the same way.
1 Corinthians 10:23 (New International Version) applies for me in this regard --
“Everything is permissible”–but not everything is beneficial. “Everything is permissible”–but not everything is constructive.
Pastor Gary,
We have something in common. My HS football team is the Rebels too. Go figure!
Dale
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