Several well-known Christians are taking issue with Democratic Senate Candidate Raphael Warnock, senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, for making controversial comments on abortion and the military.
According to CBN News, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) tweeted a 2011 sermon clip from Warnock saying, “You cannot serve God and the military.”
“Not shocked #Georgia Democrat Senate candidate Raphael Warnock said, ‘You cannot serve God and the military’ at the same time,” Rubio wrote on Wednesday. “These & even crazier things is what the radicals who control the Democratic party’s activist & small-dollar donor base believe.”
Not shocked #Georgia Democrat Senate candidate Raphael Warnock said “You cannot serve God and the military” at the same time. These & even crazier things is what the radicals who control the Democratic party’s activist & small dollar donor base believepic.twitter.com/bQyBuKLwjb
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) November 18, 2020
Warnock’s words were made in context to Jesus’ words from the sermon on the Mount, “You cannot serve God and money” (Matthew 6:24).
The megachurch pastor has since defended his statement as he told CNN’s Donald Judd, “What I was expressing was that as a person of faith, my ultimate allegiance is to God, and therefore, whatever else that I may commit myself to, it has to be built on a spiritual foundation. So it was about priorities.”
He added that his critics are “distorting scripture,” even though they argue that Warnock himself is doing that very same thing in order to advance a political agenda.
Warnock is also being criticized for his unrestricted support of abortion.
Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, endorsed Warnock’s candidacy in May.
In an interview with WGAU radio back in August, he argued that abortion was “consistent with” his philosophy as a Christian minister.
He told WGAU’s Tim Bryant that he believes “that healthcare is a human right” and that “it is something that the richest nation in the world provides for its citizens, and for me, reproductive justice is consistent with my commitment to that.”
Warnock stressed that it is unequivocally a “woman’s right to choose” without interference from the government.
The decision is between “her and her doctor and her minister,” he asserted.
Bryant then asked, “Do you think it’s consistent with God’s view – that God endorses the millions of abortions we’ve had in this country since Roe v. Wade?”
“I think that human agency and freedom is consistent with my view as a minister,” Warnock responded.
Outspoken Christian and NFL Hall of fame coach, Tony Dungy tweeted a response to Warnock’s remarks following the WGAU interview.
“When you say ‘a minister’ does that mean they represent a church? I’d like to know what book the candidate uses as their foundation for truth and their guiding principles? It couldn’t be the Bible,” he wrote.
On Tuesday, former NFL star and pro-life advocate Benjamin Watson called out the Georgia pastor for saying that he will “always fight for reproductive justice.”
Watson, who tweeted his response to Warnock, made the case for the sanctity of human life as part of what biblical justice truly entails.
“Pastor, equal access to kill a son or daughter is NOT justice.
JUSTICE is the equitable distribution of punishment AND protection.
JUSTICE is rooted in the dignity of every human endowed by their Creator.
One cannot truly fight for JUSTICE while simultaneously denying it,” he wrote.
Warnock is currently running in one of two run-off elections in Georgia where two U.S. Senate seats are up for grabs.
Related:
‘I’m a Pro-Choice Pastor,’ Raphael Warnock Says, Sparking Pro-Life Pushback
Photo courtesy: ©Getty Images/Elijah Nouvelage/Stringer
Milton Quintanilla is a freelance writer. Visit his blog Blessed Are The Forgiven.
