Followers of Christian scripture will no doubt want to refer me to the New Testament for a source of moral authority here. I can't quarrel with this, however when one brings Christ into the conversation, our cultural history and politics insist that we also consider the Christian Church and the Old Testament. The Christian Church is I think trying to update itself, but faces two serious problems. Firstly, by encompassing the Nationalistic and authoritarian Old Testament (which is perhaps more punitive than moral) it muddies the message of Christ with another that is philosophically contradictory. Secondly its history of political alliance with the state and of tribal prejudice and propaganda have left it with a heavy legacy of its own immorality to repent and therefore severely diminished respect. Even if one spoke only from the viewpoint of the New Testament and disavowed all other connections, a majority of people in our society would on some level associate what you were saying with these other components. Whether this association was in their view negative or positive hardly matters, since it means that the meaning of what is being said is bound to become blurred and obscured in the process.

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