"The Only and Universal Smoker's Church of God"
A Dutch ban on tobacco smoking indoors has been a windfall for "The Only and Universal Smoker's Church of God," which now has Dutch citizens flocking to become "Holy Smokers" -- which could let them legally circumvent the law on religious grounds.
From the piece in the Telegraph:
Michiel Eijsbouts, founder and "Smokelighter" of the church he founded in 2001, has insisted that the Dutch smoking ban in place does not apply to members of his church under national and European human rights legislation.
"We think we have all the marks of a religion," he said.
"We will have to find out what the secular powers-that-be think. For us the constitution and European rules say we have the right to express our religion and we express our religion through smoking."
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The First Commandment: smoke 'em if you got 'em!
Comments (1)
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The essence of this is that it shows the futility of ultimate solutions based on legalistic manipulation of human activity. That is, there must be inner transformation and depth motivation, not superficial prohibition. But, of course, we're not talking about murder, theft, or rape (major sins, affecting society as a whole); but what are considered bad social habits or practices (smoking, saying racial epithets, gambling, drinking, etc.). It’s the “prohibition syndrome:” if the inner drive to do it still exists, no amount of legal prohibition will make any real difference – people will find a way to “bootleg” or closet just about anything.
This plays out into the larger social arena, where we have big government trying to impose PC standards on all kinds of thought and action. You cannot effectually stop prejudice or anti-anything with legal sanctions. The sinful souls of men must be born again, with new thoughts and actions born of the Spirit. St. Paul could not stop his hatred of, and persecution of Messianic Jews until he met the risen and glorified Messiah on the road to Damascus. St. Augustine could not stop his profligate lifestype until he was changed by Christ.
This scenario of transformation/change has played innumerable times across the centuries. This is why cultures that go down the road of legal imposition of morality and behavior always end up as dictatorships, and self-destruct. It is only where biblical truth triumphs that real, long-lasting cultural change takes place: the early Church, post-Reformation northern Europe, the Wesleyan revival in England, the Great Awakenings in America, etc. Of course, all these movements were imperfect and limited; but the beneficial effects saved cultures and nations from further descent into destructive patterns of legalism and sin.
America is at the crossroads at this point. We will either opt for more big government programs, which will surely lead to failure; or we will have a TRUE restoration of biblical truth (Gospel, doctrines of grace, the Law of God). It is not essentially a political issue, but a spiritual one. Political choices merely move the nation in one direction or the other to a minor extent.
The Dutch authorities seem to have no clue about all this – as for all the post-Christian West. “The Only and Universal Smokers Church of God” is most certainly not a church, and has nothing to do with God. This just shows the extent to which addictive personalities will go to achieve their fix.
Posted on July 21, 2008 8:56 AM