Can a Bible-believing Christian be morally opposed to slavery?

They claim the bible is the word of God and therefore correct either believe it all or not at all Forefather said

It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine and murder; for the belief of a cruel God makes a cruel man.

-- Thomas Paine

Did you know that slavery really existed in Victorian England? They called it

servants, but those servants were up at dawn, worked til dusk, and had maybe

1/2 day off a week. That was just 2-3 hundred years ago.

Slavery still exists in many parts of the world.

And there's slavery and slavery, right? I might say that a person working for

$7/hr and working 3 jobs is a slave also.

In fact, I can't see any freedom there, you?

Slavery is absence of freedom, and Christianity is the answer to that.

Slaves were a reality. Christianity came to ease the burden of how things were,

and it did.

Slaves became empowered, could become useful, not just slaves.

Slavery IS....it is a fact. I also would work with individuals to learn that they

actually had a lot of freedom in Christ. This changes everything in their life,

absolutely everything.

The Jews had a very advanced system (comparatively speaking) at that time.

There will always be people, though that cannot handle responsibility, that

just want to party, do drugs, toke up, and they often lose everything.

...

Truthfully, the Church has always been opposed to slavery, from the first century to modern times.

Sadly, during the Roman Empire the young Church was fighting for its very survival, so there was little opportunity to resist slavery on an organized basis.

Although, as clearly noted in St. Paul's Letter to Philemon, the spread of the Gospel was an effective means of eradicating slavery, in which the dignity of all human persons was taught.

Additionally, during the Middle Ages the Church helped end slavery by converting the Germanic tribes who practiced it; far more determined were later popes and Church leaders.

Recall In 1537 - for example, Pope Paul III excommunicated all slave traders in the Americas for their cruel enslavement of indigenous peoples.

Following 1838, Pope Gregory XVI congratulated the bishops of Brazil when the latter country finally eradicated the slave trade.

Remember, Catholic leaders all over the world have been and are continually engaged in anti-slavery campaigns; even today, Catholics are working to stamp out the burgeoning slave trades in central and northern Africa and in parts of Asia.

Furthermore, ancient church documents require a clear study since many anti-catholics will take once sentence from the document (out of context) and cause a false grief.

I think we need to distinguish between slavery in which a human person is regarded merely as an object, versus a "slavery" which is essentially a claim against a person's future earnings due to personal or national debt, criminal offense, etc.

The first is always and everywhere wrong.

However, the second is not necessarily wrong.

Actually, the latter is clearly present within the USA via what we call "student loans," "child support," etc...

In any case, church documents from Christian sources defending "slavery" often turn out to be defending a claim against future earnings - a claim which can only be licitly exercised while respecting the fundamental human dignity of the person.

God bless'

Advocate is a strong word- a more accurate word would be tolerate.... IN any event given the vast majority of abolitionists both in Europe and the US who worked to end slavery were Bible-Believing Christians pretty much short circuits your veiled accusations..

Immune to Indoctrination: The majority of the US asserted themselves as Christians so you are saying nothing in particular... Slaves counted as 3/5 of a person towards representation so we have accurate numbers of slaves and slave ownership... 1860 Census indicates that only 5% of the population (entire US Northern and Southern states) owned slaves - not all of them were white either - 1/2 of 1 % of those slave owners were black. Moreover 85% of southern land owners did not own slaves. So you are really talking about a tiny minority of people who owned the slaves. Condemning All Christians for the actions of 5% - Seriously that is a reach! The fact is the vast Majority of Bible-Believing Christians did not own slaves, even the vast majority of land owning Bible believing Southern Christians did not own slaves.

People who invent theories without documentary support when there is a wealth of it available generaly are either lazy, have an axe to grind, or both.

The FACT of the matter is that in the United States in the 1850ies and 60ies, while there were preachers who used the Bible to justify slavery, the vast bulk of the Anti Slavery movement was pushed by preachers who used substantial Biblical quotes as their justification.

So -- the devout Christian who rejects slavery would presumably state that your quotes are in error and out of context -- and you are simply wrong.

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Getting a wee outside the Christianity bubble - and more broadly to "Old Testament" analysis --

The FACT of the matter is that

according to the Emperor Titus, the major tension which led to the Jewish War (70 CE) was that Jews were allowing runaway slaves to settle in Judea as full fledged members of society under the protection of the Jewish government.

This willingness to defy the Roman Empire on behalf of human rights almost two millenia ago was based on Deuteronomy 23:16, 17 --

" Thou shalt not deliver unto his master a bondman that is escaped from his master unto thee; he shall dwell with thee, in the midst of thee, in the place which he shall choose within one of thy gates, where it liketh him best; thou shalt not wrong him. "

Larry: " IN any event given the vast majority of abolitionists both in Europe and the US who worked to end slavery were Bible-Believing Christians pretty much short circuits your veiled accusations.."

That doesn't short circuit her argument, it just suggests that this particular form of blasphemy is very common. Besides what of the fact that the vast majority of slave owners were Bible-Believing Christians?

Slavery, as in the owning of a human being, is prohibited in the Bible.

“Anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death” (Exodus 21:16). Similarly, in the New Testament, slave-traders are listed among those who are “ungodly and sinful” and are in the same category as those who kill their fathers or mothers, murderers, adulterers and perverts, and liars and perjurers (1 Timothy 1:8-10).

The Catholic Church has always been opposed to slavery for the last 2000yrs !!!

http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/vie...