Repression of Christianity in the US

From Betty Bowers

Ms. Bower's comment:

As a conservative Christian, when I volunteer helpful critiques of other people's faiths, it's called "love." If they return the favor, it's called "persecution."

Bibles and guns? does this offend you?

I'm sure the type of person who needs to have flags, guns, and Bibles probably won't find this too offensive.  It might even be a type of Rorschach test to see where you are on the political spectrum.

In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus identifies himself with the hungry, the poor, the sick, and the prisoners.  That passage is considered a major aspect of Christianity and is the cornerstone of Christian socialism.  Another key statement in the New Testament that is an important component of Christian socialism is Luke 10:25-37 that follows the statement "You shall love your neighbour as yourself" with the question "And who is my neighbour?", and in the Parable of the Good Samaritan Jesus gives the revolutionary response that the neighbour includes anyone in need, even people we might be expected to shun.

Socialism owes more to the Bible than Marx.

Acts 4, verse 32:

"All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions were his own, but they shared everything they had."

and Acts 4, verses 34 and 35:

"There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from their sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need."

John Chrysostom explained his attitude towards the rich and wealth by saying:

I am often reproached for continually attacking the rich. Yes, because the rich are continually attacking the poor. But those I attack are not the rich as such, only those who misuse their wealth. I point out constantly that those I accuse are not the rich, but the rapacious; wealth is one thing, covetousness another. Learn to distinguish.

Change it to Muslim and see what their reaction is...

Funny, but if you changed the word "Christian" to "Muslim" in some right wing screeds, that you would see people going apoplectic.  Strange, but they just don't quite get what that means.

Anywaly, I'd prefer to live in Europe where this shit isn't tolerated than in someplace that fancies itself as Iran or Afghanistan or some other Islamic terror land only rebranded "Christian".

Sorry, but the only difference is that the one on the left isn't as modestly dressed.

We’re curious what, if any, difference there is between these two pictures? Both women worship the same god. Both of them are holding a book that heavily mentions Jesus, and both are unnecessarily heavily armed–and then there’s the intolerance demonstrated by extremists of either of these very similar religions.

Thank you, Holly, for proving me correct:

Sinclair Lewis on Fascism updated, or my Ambrose Bierce moment

This is a reference to Ambrose Bierce’s entry on Patriotism in the Devil’s Dictionary where he says:

In Dr. Johnson’s famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.

Likewise, Sinclair Lewis’s rather famous quote on fascism that:

“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”

With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior writer I beg to submit that when fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in a flag, carrying a cross and a gun, while claiming it is all being done in the name of the Constitution.

Counterproductive politics

There is an interesting interview on today's Newshour about the rise of the religious right in the US. One of the interviewees points out that the number of evangelical Christians in the US is declining due to its involvement in religion.

I've found that gunloon comments tend to reinforce my belief that the US needs gun control due to the fact that these people are not responsible and have no idea of what right the Second Amendment was intended on protecting. Add in that the institution of militia is pretty much an anachronism. In fact, the militia was irrelevant at the time of the Revolution (see Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations).

Anyway, we have already seen that the Heller-McDonald decisions have nor resulted in much in roads being made in the field of gun rights. And as the word of Revolution go "if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao, you ain't going to make with anyone anyhow".

Perhaps saying that a variant of "Political Power comes from the barrel of a gun" will backfire on them as badly as failing to heed that religion and politics should not be intertwined.

Right Wing Nuts Still Wrong, Still Extreme, Still Harping on the Turkey Thing

This turkey of a story has more legs than ......well, than a real turkey has drumsticks!  Right wing watch caught this from the American Family's Bryan Fischer (he's also afraid of Mormons as well as Muslims) who was prominent in Rick Perry's political evangelism event earlier this year. 

This is not a passing aberration; this turkey story.  Rather this is part if a larger issue, a core theme, a central topic in the 2012 GOP political debate.

To correct the inaccuracies that Fischer is pushing - all turkeys are slaughtered the SAME. There is NO PRAYER said over them, and they are not labeled as being different, because they are NOT different from the way non-religious designated meat iss always slaughtaered - (and not just turkeys) . Any turkeys tht are subsequently labeled Halal - OR KOSHER - have the pertinent religious requirements satisfied for such labeling at the retail distribution source, where the labeling is then, appropriately, noted.

In the case of Butterball turkeys, Butterball indicates this occurs primarily in other countries to which they sell turkeys; there are more than 20 other countries to which Butterball exports this American ag product.

Fischer was a prominent speaker at the Rick Perry Prayer event; he was a prominent speaker at the Values Voter Summit, where every political candidate in the GOP Presidential contest spoke, along with the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, and Majority Leader Eric Cantor.  Islamophobia is a key part of a number of our would-be candidates, notably Gingrich, Cain, Bachmann, Santorum.  The only consistent exception has been Ron Paul, and he is highly unlikely to be the next GOP presidential candidate.

These candidates have a fundamentalist approach that would make Christianity and secular law identical.  They would make a Christian version of our secular law which given NO religion a preference something different than what it is NOW.  Frightening people over Sharia law and pseudo-Halal turkey is not different than some of the similar anti-Semitic tactics which used to target Jews.

This Halal turkey story is NOT going away, it is not merely a minor embarassment of a lone extremist.  It IS part of a larger facet of conservative politics.  It is a dog whistle; it is fear mongering, a straw man bogey man of hatred.  In that sense, it is no different than the straw man effigy that conservative students burned in Scotland.  This is just a different Islamic strawman, thrown on a different bonfire, a U.S. conservative bonfire.

These people throw around the word Freedoms constantly.  But what they want to do is to take away freedom - freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, rule of non-partisan unbiased law.

We don't need religious crazy fundamentalists in the White House. We don't need race and ethnic or religious hatred in our politics.

I found this quote from Reuters about the crosses case in question, which pertains ONLY so far as I understand this, to the installation of a religious symbol on public property.  In the past there have also been controversies about putting up crosses to honor someone who was not Christian but another religion - notably Jewish, which boiled down to the issue of are crosses specifically Christian or not (it was determined they were) so a further issue here may have been the respective religions, or atheism, of the fallen officers.

"The challenge to the Utah crosses was brought by a Texas-based group called American Atheists, which sued to remove the memorials from state property."

I haven't gone looking for any studies yet, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a close correlation between being pro-gun, and anti-muslim/anti-sharia law, and those who are also pro-Christian dominionism/christian political evangelism. That excludes Jews, Muslims, and Mormons, and in some cases Roman Catholics. I'm not saying ALL pro-gunners are fundamentalist crazy haters and bigots, but there IS a significant overlap.

Fischer would ban Muslims from joining our armed forces, and has also lobbied for Muslims to be allowed to immigrate to this country ONLY if they converted to Christianity, as well as demanded that Native Americans convert to Christianity 'in order to be full U.S. citizens'. Fischer has had extensive support from the candidates, some even before they were running for President, including during their campaigns for other offices.

The sham historian David Barton has also been prominently promoted by a number of the Republican candidates, especially Michele Bachmann who has invited this pseudo-scholar to address 'classes' on the U.S. Constitution - which he is emphatically NOT qualified to do by any legitimtate standard of knowledge - specifically to promote the idea that this is an exclusively Christian nation, and that other religions should at best be tolerated, but that U.S. laws must conform to "Biblical Christianity".