Israel Folau was today officially sacked from the Australia rugby union team for a homophobic Instagram post.
The decision makes the devout Christian the first Australian athlete dismissed for expressing religious beliefs.
Folau, 30, has the right to appeal and have his case heard at a second code of conduct hearing by a new panel.
But he will reportedly skip that process and head straight to court to argue that he is being persecuted for his religion.
In a press conference this afternoon, Rugby Australia CEO Raelene Castle said Folau was a 'great player' but that everyone has the right to be respected regardless of sexuality, race, gender or religion.
After Folau was sacked, former Wallabies coach Alan Jones said Rugby Australia had 'internationally destroyed his name for quoting a passage from the bible'.
[...] 'Our clear message today is that we need to stand by our values and the qualities of inclusion, passion, integrity, discipline, respect and teamwork.'
Ms Castle said she had told all rugby players in Australia that RA supports their rights to their own beliefs.
'But when we are talking about inclusiveness in our game, we are talking about respecting differences as well,' she said.
'When we say rugby is a game for all, we mean it. People need to feel safe and welcoming in the game, regardless of their race, background or sexuality.
'When players sign a contract with the Wallabies, they sign up to the values of the team and the sport.As a recovering libertarian myself, I'm somewhat slow and loath to admit that this is probably true, but "free speech" is a failed concept, caused by secular over-reach. In reality, nothing is ever "free" of course; freedom is constrained by the expectations of the community, and free speech as a concept, at least in America and much of the Anglo-world, was about the freedom to criticize political leaders without being persecuted by the government because of it. You were never free to run around insulting people right and left and expecting no consequences, for instance. Christianity used to maintain blasphemy laws within Christendom as well. It's now obvious that lacking Christian blasphemy laws, society will eventually establish secular, SJW-inspired, Satanic blasphemy laws, and use them to persecute Christians and Christianity.
Of course, free speech worked quite well in America and in the rest of the Anglo-cultural world when our communities were not adulterated by non-Anglo-cultural individuals with non-Anglo-cultural values. It's easy to blame the arrival in particular of the Jews (but also the Papist Irish and Italians, to a lesser degree) for this conflict, especially with their habits of 1) seeking out rentier careers such as judges who deliberately misinterpret what the Constitution actually says in order to favor their own cultural values, 2) took over other rentier careers to propagandize their own cultural values at the expense of the native cultural values, i.e., media, entertainment, academia, and politics, and 3) have hated and persecuted Christianity since the time of their Pharisee ancestors. And that would be correct, but also insufficient. They should be free to live according to their customs as well as they please, although they needed their own homeland in which to do so, so they could be unmolested by others in their community who did not share their values, and vice versa. (Of course, now the Jews do have their own homeland again, established and maintained under the auspices of their culture.)
We let them come here. We let them take those positions. We didn't challenge their obviously anti-American, anti-Christian and anti-American bias. While those who brought those calamities on us will certainly be responsible for their own sins in eternity, those who refused to stand with Christ, defend his values, and allow themselves to be swayed by the flattering words of temptation are also responsible for their own decisions.
Matthew 7: "13 Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? 17 Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. 19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. 20 Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. 21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? 23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity."Those who followed Nehor, or Korihor, or Sherem or any of the other anti-Christs during the Nephites time may not have been the instigators that those named individuals were, but they were still in gross need of repentance.
As an aside, the Church has itself just recently stepped into this issue a bit, obviously very concerned for the threats to righteousness and freedom that the SJW heresy represents. I personally believe that while this position is of course correct, it will only work with a reasonably righteous people with a reasonably homogenous cultural context to work together. That does not mean, of course, that the Church shouldn't establish a line in the sand for righteous behavior, because of course that is exactly its role, but as members of the Church, we should not be surprised to find that in our increasingly wicked world, finding those willing to abide by the precepts of righteousness will be increasingly difficult, and we should expect serious and significant challenges to successfully establishing or even maintaining society based on such precepts. I just recently (yesterday even) finished reading Moroni chapters 7-10 and then turned around and started the Book of Mormon over again, but reading Mormon's words to his son Moroni, and Moroni's own words about conditions among the Nephites when they were fully ripened in iniquity was quite discouraging (no doubt considerably moreso to them than to me, but seeing the parallels with my own people was not fun.)
On the other hand, I don't believe that Americans are fully ripened in iniquity yet either. I think many have been blinded and led away by false prophets of SJWism, and I think many in naivety and foolishness (and maybe to some degree lacking in courage) have made foolish decisions and made unwarranted assumptions of good intent of those who clearly do not have good intent, and this combination of 1) lack of courage, 2) naivety and blindness, and 3) failure to adopt the true, unadulterated Gospel and build their faith and hope on it will yet be the source of a great deal of suffering amongst our people. But I can hope and pray that it will also spur them to remember their God and soften their hearts to accept the full Gospel represented only within the Church and that a portion of my people will be preserved in righteousness through the coming calamities.
Because in the meantime, even within the Church, there is a distressing separation of the wheat from the tares that is readily and easily observable.
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