LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY davidkevin)

Last night Bob Wells of KJSL-AM radio here in St. Louis said that Oprah Winfrey was not a real Christian, but believed in a demonically inspired false Christianity, listing his reasons why. Here is the text of an e-mail I sent him afterward.


Bob, I love the inverted 1984 Newspeak universe in which you live.  Not.

A God Who condemns 90% of His creation to eternal fire and punishment, a God Who proclaims love as evil and war as good, Who proclaims hatred to your brother and sister humans who perceive Him differently than your interpretation, is the scriptural God.

A God Who loves his creation and proclaims a Gospel of Redemption, a God Who doesn't care who you love as long as love and decency toward your brothers and sisters is in your heart, a God Who proclaims mercy and charity, that's a really a demon in disguise.

The God of Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy Who proclaims Death and Murder to those who violate the least of His laws, to the point of striking dead someone who tried to keep the Arc of the Covenant from being despoiled by grabbing it before it could fall onto the ground; a God Who killed for the attempt to practice primitive birth control (Onan), a God Who said it was okay to sell your daughter into slavery for money; a God who thought it was a cool trick to make His prophet believe that he had to murder his own son in a bloody ritual sacrifice; a God who tortured his servant Job, murdering his family, afflicting him with painful illness, destroying his wealth for a whimsical test, that's the True God.

The God of the Sermon on the Mount, Who said to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, pray in private, comfort the widowed and imprisoned, that's the demons talking.

The God Who wishes to take Dominion over others, to rule by the sword and the gun over even those who do not acknowledge Him, that's the real God.

The God Who said "My Kingdom is not of this world" and "render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's", that's the God of demons.

It's terrible to live in either sheer, unadulterated terror or false righteousness under a God like that. I know, I lived under the first as a child, seeing God through a glass darkly.  Now I've put away childish things.  I wish you could, too.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

An article in the Times-Herald sums up the attitude of the Far Right, now that it is in power:

Dobson also has written some choice words about another miscreant, Sen. Patrick Leahey, D-Vt.

This is the same Patrick Leahey who was on the receiving end of Vice President Dick Cheney's urging that he go do something to himself I can't print in this newspaper.

"Patrick Leahy is a God's people hater," Dobson wrote. "I don't know if he hates God, but he hates God's people."

To which Stephanopoulos said: "Now Dr. Dobson, that doesn't sound like a particularly Christian thing to say. Do you think you owe Senator Leahy an apology?"

Dobson replied: "George, you think you ought to lecture me on what a Christian is all about?"

Well, somebody should. The good doctor must have missed the Sunday school class where they teach you that you should at least respect people you decide are your enemies.

He also missed the class where they teach you not to think for God.

The danger of Dobson and his cronies is they really believe this stuff. There is no room for dissent or tolerance in their world.

They believe they have a corner on faith and patriotism. But I'm reminded the most patriotic people in World War II were the Germans, and the most patriotic Germans were the Nazis, who knew they had all the answers.

One of my favorite Bible verses is Isaiah 1:18. It was Lyndon Johnson's favorite, too: "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord."

Reasoning together has gone out of style. People such as Dobson just make things worse.

They perpetuate the stereotype that people of faith are intolerant, bigoted ideologues who prefer name-calling to true religion. They believe they've bought the cross and the flag and must merge them with the Republican Party.

Those who dissent are wrong. Period.

You know, unless something changes, the radical right might just give Christianity a bad name.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This Common Dreams again questions the suddenly fashionable addition of religion into the government sphere.

Listen to us talk at each other, will you?

We Americans are actually debating in the public square not which policy is the most practical or most wise, or which leader is the more competent, but which is the most Christian. We have taken religion — the highest expression of human thought and spirit — and we have cheapened it by using it as a weapon to attack and belittle those with whom we disagree.

Religious leaders are even daring to instruct us in how to vote, and in some cases are suggesting that those who dare to vote contrary to their leaders' wishes risk their soul and standing with God.

This is America?

We know better than this. Or at least we used to. We used to understand that government and religion function best when they function independently, when the only link between them is the indirect link of human beings acting out their private faith through public service. We used to understand that if religion takes a direct role in government, government must inevitably take a direct role in religion, and that the long-standing wall between them was built for the protection of both institutions.

But I guess those are some of the traditional American values now under attack by the dominant political and cultural elite, the Christian right. Yes, that group still likes to depict itself as the most victimized group in American public life, but that's a mere pose, a sham designed to stroke its members' egos and satisfy their need to feel persecuted. That same group, after all, is also beating its chest, proclaiming itself as the nation's most powerful political group to which even the president and Congress must now pay homage. Logically, both self-images cannot be true.

It's too bad, really, because in a rough sense we already know how this story ends. We've seen it so many times before. There is no case in recorded human history, regardless of era or culture, in which religion and government have been intertwined without eventually compromising basic human freedoms. Inevitably, every time, that relationship gets out of control and people get hurt.