LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY nebris)

Invalid video URL.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY nebris)

( A recent essay in Time magazine claimed 'The religious right's era is over.' Someone better tell that to the GOP presidential candidates praying for the fundamentalist movement's blessings. )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY pretentioustfu)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070415/us_nm/usa_church_dc

Article behind the cut

( La-la-la, I can't hear you tell me I'm wrong. . . )

I don't know why, but reading this just made me feel really, really sad and empty. I can't put my finger on why, either, but maybe someone here can.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY navytron89) So I was reading bartsnotes and see how the fundies are trying to influence children now with an Jesus Christ Action Figure Line.

Personally I find this offensive as this is just another attempt for the Religious Reich and their lackies to warp culture to their own twisted views. The sicker thing is they plan to mass market them to little poor children as personal motivation to make them "better" Christians.

UPDATE:
The plan to mass marketing this pieces of crap for $25-35 in Christian Bookstores nationwide and will release them to the general public around Christmas time for the fundies children and their friends children.  Also there are  plans on showing them on the 700 Club in the next few weeks, so Pat Robertson's flock of retards will buy them up to make more of them. There is also talk in the toy biz about how these may become a investable item, which sicken me. They can't leave pop culture alone now Theocrats have to violate it. 

( Here is the worst one of the bunch....  )

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

This Americans United article talks about the crumbling wall between church and state:

President George W. Bush strayed not far from the White House today to rehash one of his favorite themes: Why we should all have to pay for someone else’s religion.

Speaking before the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast at a Washington, D.C. hotel, Bush extolled the “faith-based” initiative, which entails directing millions of federal dollars to religious groups allegedly so they can provide social services.

“One of the reasons that I am such a strong believer in the power of our faith-based institutions is that they add something the government never can, and that is love,” the president told the religious gathering.

He then said that Catholic groups all over the land are “leading America’s armies of compassion. You are changing America one heart, one soul at a time, and I thank you.”

The president’s push for state-funded faith didn’t stop there. He then launched into a tired promotion of welfare for Catholic schools. He backed requiring all taxpayers to prop up these church-run institutions.

OK, did he just say that taxpayers have to dip into their depleted pockets to fund love? What was that Beatle's song: "Can't Buy Me Love"?

It gets worse- Bush is going directly against Thomas Jefferson's wishes:

In the Virginia religious freedom act’s preamble, Jefferson condemned public financing of religion.

Jefferson wrote that compelling people “to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions” they don’t believe “is sinful and tyrannical” and that even forcing a citizen to “support this or that teacher of his own religious persuasion, is depriving him of the comfortable liberty of giving his contributions to the particular pastor whose morals he make his pattern ….”

Jefferson’s words in favor of religious freedom and the right to support only the religions you choose (if any) remain powerfully passionate and eloquent. His words are cited today be individuals worldwide who yearn for freedom of conscience. Bush has offered no defense of religious liberty to be remembered. He instead has ignobly led a drive to trample the First Amendment and meld government and religion.

I do not want one penny of my taxes going into any church's pocket. Period. Yet, it is, against my wishes. We need to stop funding religious institutions of any sort. Let them grub for their own money.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY berkeleyfarm)

As has been noted in comments on nebris's recent post here, the idea that the Christian Right is whupped is wishful thinking. Wallis *is* being a bit optimistic, even though "the wind is changing" (if you've heard him speak or read "God's Politics", he urges us to "change the wind" in the direction of compassion). Recent history should show that the backchannel organizations are pretty strong, and will also not be bothered by the truth in their efforts to get their own way.

As one example, here is one effort by one of the "patriot pastor" dominionist wingnuts. As a Christian I don't have an objection to the "no king but King Jesus" part per se, but the idea of conflating church and state doesn't follow on from this.

I wish these folks wouldn't cherry-pick US history, much like they cherry-pick the Bible, to support their heresies. What is Caesar is not of God. Jesus did not come on earth to establish a political kingdom, which surprised folks at the time because that's what they were expecting out of a Messiah. And the Baptist/AoG/"independent Bible church" wingnuts who call on the name of the Founding Fathers' original intent in their desire to establish a state religion would have been fined or thrown in the stocks in the Virginia colony pre-independence ... the state religion there was Anglican and Anabaptists weren't well recieved. Not only was the religion clause of the First Amendment a way to keep all the different competing religious interests in the Original 13 happy, Jefferson had seen the results and didn't like them.

If y'all need some humor after this, and haven't seen the "Ted Haggard Is Completely Heterosexual" folk song video, Charlotte Bob says check it out.

Tip of the hat to Shakesville for both of these.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY sunfell)

bradhicks takes up an intersting subthread in the Baptist Church- opposition to the 'emerging church' and the imposition of unsound doctorine upon the various congregations.

"Theologically Sound", but Opposed by Southern Baptists is a must-read, in depth article that explores how a Christian sect can find themselves beached by unsound theology.

...I proved (to my satisfaction, at least) that using the term "Faustian bargain" to describe the relationship between Christian fundamentalism and the Republican Party is painfully literal, that starting in 1964 the leaders of the top fundamentalist seminaries began the process of replacing Christian doctrines with explicitly Satanic ones out of self defense, in order to more closely ally themselves and their followers with the anti-Communist caucus of the Republican Party. I demonstrated that the gospel of social reaction and corporate greed that was taught in those seminaries, and that is now enforced by church leaders who graduated from those seminaries (or laymen whose pastors did) is a false gospel that, if the actual Christian Bible is to be believed, is sending them and their deceived followers straight to Hell.

Got your attention? If that didn't, this certainly will:

Some of you may have doubted me. In particular, you may have doubted that the leaders who made these decisions knew that the gospel they were preaching, and that they have spent decades evicting from their denominations any preacher that wouldn't conform to, is anti-Christian. If you still doubt this, then take a good look at Post-Dispatch religion reporter Tim Townsend's April 2nd interview with the chairman of the Missouri Baptist Convention, Roger Moran, "Missouri's Most Powerful Baptist Takes On the 'Emerging Church.'" In particular, observe the final paragraphs, where Moran admits that he is fighting hard against a group of local Christian evangelists who are "theologically conservative," that is to say fellow Biblical literalists (more so than him, it turns out), successful in reaching people for Christ and bringing people back to the church who've left it. Even Moran admits that what they preach, and practice, "may be theologically sound" and that "they have a passion for reaching people for Christ ... and I think they do." And that's what he opposes. [emphasis Brad's] He opposes them because what they're teaching is God's actual word, not his personal gospel.

Go read the post and the links. If you are a Baptist, and still believe in the Priesthood of the Believer, this will show you how preachers like Moran are undermining it, and your sect.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY morchades)

Stumbled across this, and I don't believe its been linked here before. This webpage is a collection of quotes and political cartoons about theocracy in the US.

LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY nebris)

From Pacific Views
April 16, 2007

The role of religion in our politics has been growing steadily and the strongest religious voices have been on the religious right who after decades of shunning politics decided to enter into the fray wholeheartedly in the 1980s. According to fundamentalist Christian leaders like Pat Robertson the problems in the United States are the fault of the mainstream culture. In the minds of many fundamentalists, 9/11 happened because Americans have been too tolerant and too accepting of abortion and homosexuality. They want to stamp out the culture that they see is so dangerous and compel Americans to follow their scripture or to be condemned.

( Ironically, one of their biggest fights with the American mainstream society is how difficult it has been to keep their children in the fundamentalist camp when they grow up )