Yesterday (September 7th), I
preached a 9/11 remembrance sermon that was transmitted LIVE via
Livestream. Much of the sermon focused
on the sharp contrast between Christianity and Islam. I didn’t hold back from proclaiming the truth
about radical Islam being evil … as manifested daily by Muslim extremists
worldwide. You can see and hear it for
yourself at [https://new.livestream.com/accounts/3709164]. It
will be interesting to see if Livestream interprets it as ‘hate speech’ and
removes it from the archives of sermons I’ve delivered.
Now you might say: Livestream
shouldn’t be able to remove the sermon; you’ve paid for the Livestream account
… for which you are correct. But don’t
think for a moment that the ‘PC’ police aren’t on patrol. It’s already happening! Read on.
The pastor of the small-town First Baptist
Church in Moreland, GA recently got banned from YouTube after he posted a video
sermon he gave about the persecution of Christians in the Middle East. Pastor Daniel Ausbun said, “Apparently, they
didn’t like me preaching on radical Islam, so I got booted and banned” from
YouTube.
On August 24, Pastor Ausbun
delivered a sermon about ‘Islamic State’ terrorism, radical Islam and Christian
persecution in the Middle East. “So many
people in the church had been asking about it,” the pastor told Todd Starnes of
Townhall.com. “This was almost more of an educational sermon,”
said the pastor. Ausbun told his
congregation that Middle Eastern Christians were given a choice to convert to
Islam, pay a tax, leave immediately or face death. He also warned that ISIS is recruiting
Westerners. He encouraged his
congregation to pray for the Gospel message to advance … despite terrorism and
war.
About three-and-a-half years ago, Pastor
Ausbun started a YouTube channel for church members who missed the Sunday
service. Over the years, there was never
a problem. But then on August 27, he
said, “I received an email from YouTube telling me that my account had been
terminated for violation of the terms of service and their community guidelines. They actually terminated my entire account.”
Pastor Ausbun said he decided to
read YouTube’s community guidelines, and that’s when he put two and two
together. They thought his sermon
amounted to ‘hate speech.’ YouTube clearly
states that it doesn’t permit “hate speech” – and that includes “speech which
attacks or demeans a group based on race or ethnic origin, religion” and so on
and so forth. “They didn’t tell me exactly why they terminated my account,
but by default there was nothing else wrong,” Ausbun said. “It had to be hate speech.” For the past week he’s been trying to reach
someone at YouTube to explain what happened. So far, his calls have gone unreturned.
I don’t know what (exactly) Pastor
Ausbun said … for the obvious reason that YouTube removed his sermon. But I do know – YouTube apparently can censor
any pulpit across America that they deem as ‘hate speech.’ It makes you wonder what other messages of
truth are being banned!?
You may recall, YouTube came under
criticism after ISIS was allowed to post a video showing the beheading of
American journalist James Foley. They removed
the video and explained its policy in a statement to the website Mediaite:
“YouTube has clear policies that prohibit content like gratuitous violence,
hate speech and incitement to commit violent acts, and we remove videos
violating these policies when flagged by our users,” the statement read. “We also terminate any account registered by a
member of a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization and used in an official
capacity to further its interests.”
To the best of anyone’s knowledge,
the First Baptist Church in Moreland is not a foreign terrorist organization. The pastor says he simply wanted to inform his
church about the threat posed by Islamic terrorists and pray for the victims of
their Islamic slaughter. Is that “hate
speech?”
“I’m literally terminated – like I’m
the terrorist,” said Pastor Ausbun. He
went on to say what happened to him could happen to other American pastors
under the guise of banning “hate speech.”
“Anything a pastor preaches on – whether it be radical Islam,
homosexuality, the teachings of Jesus – YouTube can label that hate speech and
censor their sermons,” he said. In the
meantime, Pastor Ausbun has launched a new video channel – on Vimeo.
Perhaps you had better quickly
view/listen to my archived sermons before Livestream decides that my faithful
preaching of God’s Word is ‘hate speech.’
Rev.
Dr. Kenneth L. Beale, Jr.
Chaplain
(Colonel-Ret), U.S. Army
Pastor, Ft. Snelling Memorial Chapel
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