The Religious Right’s Political Power Ebbs
WASHINGTON - Palm Sunday two years ago was a glorious day for Christian conservatives.
A president who’d proclaimed Jesus his favorite philosopher was racing back from vacation to sign a bill rushed through a compliant Congress at their bidding - a last-minute gamble to keep alive a severely brain-damaged woman in Florida.
That, however, was the peak of the Christian conservatives’ political power.
Today, their nearly three-decade-long ascendance in the Republican Party is over. Their loyalties and priorities are in flux, the organizations that gave them political muscle are in disarray, the high-profile preachers who led them to influence through the 1980s and 1990s are being replaced by a new generation that’s less interested in their agenda and their hold on politics and the 2008 Republican presidential nomination is in doubt.
“Less than four years after declarations that the Religious Right had taken over the Republican Party, these social conservatives seem almost powerless to influence its nomination process,” said W. James Antle III, an editor at the American Spectator magazine who’s written extensively about religious conservatives.
“They have the numbers. They have the capability. What they don’t have is unity or any institutional leverage.”
The Religious Right never had absolute power in the Republican Party. It never got the Republican president and Republican Congress to pursue a constitutional amendment banning abortion, for example.
But it did have enormous clout in party politics and a big voice in policy, and it’s lost much of both heading into 2008.
In the presidential campaign, for example, candidate Rudy Giuliani consistently leads national polls of likely Republican voters despite his support for abortion rights and gay rights, not to mention his three marriages.
Fred Thompson boasts of a strong voting record against abortion, yet he admitted recently that he doesn’t go to church regularly and wouldn’t support a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage because he’d rather leave it to the states.
“He is apparently the Great Hope that burns in the breasts of many conservative Christians,” social conservative James Dobson said sarcastically in an e-mail to fellow conservatives. “Well, not for me, my brothers. Not for me.”
Yet Thompson’s support as measured by polls nationally and in the early voting states apparently hasn’t suffered.
And all of the top Republican candidates felt free to skip a values forum in Florida organized by some of the country’s top social conservatives, including Paul Weyrich of the Free Congress Foundation, Phyllis Schlafly of the Eagle Forum and Don Wildmon of the American Family Association.
The candidates will appear at a similar values voters gathering in Washington, D.C., but the snub of such high-profile social conservatives in a politically important state such as Florida would have been unlikely in the 1980s or 1990s.
“None of these candidates are ignoring conservative Christians,” said John Green, a political scientist at the University of Akron, “but they’re not giving them as much attention as occurred in past elections. … There is at least the perception that these voters don’t have the influence they once had.”
In church, the generation of politically active, high profile evangelists such as Pat Robertson and the late Jerry Falwell is giving way to new preachers such as Joel Osteen and Rick Warren, who shun partisan politics or are willing to embrace Democrats.
Warren, for example, hosted Democratic Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois at his California mega-church. He cites AIDS, poverty and illiteracy as top issues, not gay marriage or abortion.
In elections, the organizations that once gave political focus to Christian conservatives and turned their passions into votes have splintered or disappeared.
The biggest of them all, the Christian Coalition, is a shell of its former self. Its budget has crashed from a 1996 peak of $26 million to about $1 million. Its new director wants to expand to issues besides abortion and marriage. And state chapters in Alabama, Georgia, Iowa and Ohio have parted ways with the group they think is now too liberal.
Keith Appell, a Republican strategist, thinks that social conservatives appear less influential only because they’re divided over the 2008 candidates and have lost the megaphone they once had in strong groups and high-profile leaders.
“There’s a leadership vacuum that has not been filled,” Appell said. “The longer it goes unfilled, the more the perception increases that their influence has decreased.”
In the country, many people have shifted priorities. Even among white evangelical Christians, Iraq and other domestic issues are now more important than social issues, according to a recent poll by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
One reason could be that religious conservatives are victims of their own success. They managed to win a ban on late-term abortions and see it upheld by the Supreme Court. They helped drive dozens of states to adopt constitutional amendments or laws against gay marriage.
“Marriage doesn’t seem to have the immediacy it had,” said Green of the University of Akron, who is also a scholar at the Pew Forum.
Another could be that issues like abortion, which were more prominent in the relative peace and prosperity of the 1990s, have been trumped by war and the threat of terrorism in the 2000s.
“Some of the social issues have receded a bit,” Green said. “The rise of the social issues was fairly dramatic toward the end of 1990s and start of the new century. But after 9-11, foreign policy again became a very important thing. People’s priorities do change with events.”
Many social conservatives themselves are debating their political priorities, with some suggesting that fighting AIDS or poverty is as or more important than defending heterosexual marriage. That could further complicate the political role of Christian conservatives - if Republicans nominate Giuliani.
“They are making a very grave miscalculation if they nominate a pro-choice candidate like Giuliani,” said Richard Land, a Tennessee evangelist and the president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.
“Most evangelicals have been voting Republican because they were given a bright-line choice between a pro-life candidate and a pro-choice candidate. If that issue were taken off the table, then other issues get oxygen, issues where evangelicals are not nearly as certain that Republicans offer the best answer. Issues like economic justice, racial reconciliation, the environment.
“If the Republicans are foolish enough to nominate a pro-choice candidate, they give the Democrats a license to go hunting evangelical votes.”
McClatchy Newspapers 2007
The Evangelical sect are the Taliban of religion. People whom believe in the bible don’t believe in unrestricted murder of innocent people. Pat Robertson and hate teacher Jerry Farwell are perfect examples of supporting Bushieboy Herr George in all his criminal activities. If anyone are looking for terrorist then let’s clean out people like those.
Once in awhile there is good news.
I wouldn’t count the Religious Right out, yet. The end of their political power has been repeatedly announced since 1980. In 1999 and 2000 we had several MEMBERS of the Religious Right writing books and articles about their political influence ending–and then it came roaring back.
I have written on my blog, http://levellers.wordpress.com , several reasons to see signs of the waning of the Religious Right–but I also warn about claiming that they are dead too soon. They have regrouped many times before and could easily do so again. Be vigilant. Don’t kid yourselves that if ignore the Religious Right will just fade away.
It will take resurgence by the Religious Left and Center to keep the Religious Right at bay.
Read a little history, and learn how the Nazi party co-opted the Lutheran Church while gaining power, created an institutional ‘German Christian Church’ with a theology that allowed Nazi atrocities, and then dismissed that creation once they had power to compel obedience from the population by brownshirted force.
We are about two thirds along in that cycle in the US. Corporate control of the government has solidified under this administration, while torture of prisoners and the routine tasering of dissidents are now considered palatable options.
Blackwater’s praetorian guard acts with impunity, at home and abroad, so there is little need remaining for cover behind wedge issues.
The sheep on the ’social right’ will see how badly they’ve been deceived, but they won’t be able to do anything about it. The American equivalent of Germany’s underground ‘Confessing Church’ is now becoming more vocal, but they haven’t yet begun filling the prisons the way they’ll need to in order to re-take what they ceded in the name of religious tolerance.
Other developments this article doesn’t take into account:
1) How completely institutionalized the ‘American Christian Church’ actually is, with its Congressional Prayer Breakfasts, lobbyists in the corridors of power, and actionable discrimination against non-adherents in the military.
2) How aberrant the theology of these folks actually is from any scriptural or historical context.
3) The effect on the secular population and on moderate-conservative Christians of recent airplay given to more progressive Christian voices. These fight the fascist quasi-Xians on their own turf, demonstrating that there is more than one sort of Christian believer, and openly splitting the ‘Christian vote’.
4) The fact that ’social issues’ are not limited to the wedge issues defined by the right. This article (and the Pew Study) accept the terms of the debate as the Right lays them out. But most issues the Pew study classifies as ‘Domestic’ are as easily defined as ’social issues’ (e.g., education, health care, elder care, living wages).
thank god if this is indeed true (with all puns and irony intended).
How could one believe that we are getting dumber?
Karl Rove has been a straw man for the Democrats to hide their incompetence
Blame “Miss Piggy” as Karl Rove is called in the DC gay scene
People whom believe in the bible don’t believe in unrestricted murder of innocent people.
**True-Ol Jehovah is very selective in his edicts to commit mass murder..
1 Samuel 15: 3 Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
Deuteronomy 7:1-11 “When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou; 2 And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them
When the Inter-left starts to get an education about religion, as opposed to typing out sophomoric diatribes based on snippets of the complex and diverse history of humankind’s relationship with faith, then there might be some potential to this form of political organizing. I submit that the failure of the left to gain traction despite the overwhelming agreement of the American population with progressive policy goals is precisely and entirely the result of most of the left choosing ignorance and bigotry over information-gathering and bridge-building.
Religion is as complicated as any other facet of human existence. It can’t be reduced to narrow stereotypes or explained with facile theoretical reasoning. it certainly can’t be understood to any meaningful degree without long study, and through interaction with a wide range of religious people. The Inter-left helps no one with the broad scathing attacks on most of the world’s population. Perhaps the goal is to steal a rocket and settle the moon with pre-approved humans who are proven through scientific means not to be believers in invisible things. No? Then you’re going to have to accept that religion is not going away. Just as you are asking the sadly ignorant fundies to accept that gay people are not going away. If you want things to operate at a higher standard of ethics, you have to start by operating by that standard yourself. It is wrong and counter-productive to hurl insults. it is a tiny percentage of Christians and Muslims and Hindus who are responsible for the stereotypes. You don’t have to agree with anyone’s cosmology to see that interaction is essential, peacemaking is meaningless unless it is with people whose views you don’t share. Or is the left content to simply be a mirror of the right.
Religion is based on an appeal to some higher source to effect change in the physical world.
Organized religion is a political population control device.
Spirituality is personal. I am very aware of the spirit world, howevery, there is no one other than myself who belongs to my religion.
I scrutinize all religious tenets from everywhere because they are designed to shape the opinions and actions to conform to those of a small, powerful few.
Both Bush and bin laden claim they speak with god, and we all know how thats been working out for us. If you need to belive in some religious fairy tales, so be it. But please, keep your god out of my government. Bottom-line if your talking to God and he is answering, then you my friend are suffering from schizophrenia. History has shown that humanity has spilled more blood in the name of god than for any other reason.
meri
Whoops! “the president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.” This title screams “oxymoron!” Which takes me to the comments of MUGGLES5. Ordinarily I would agree with your theoretical context and content; but when the military USES Christian rhetoric to fuel soldiers’ passion for war, when the president PRETENDS he has God on his side (and hears his direction), when Blackwater’s mercenary forces come under the profitable purview of Eric Prince, a “born again Christian,” then religion is playing a HUGE role in war. As John Dean has elaborated, the increasing authoritarian nature of a great many Americans and their adherence to their church leaders creates an insidious marriage between what should be the private acts of faith and the political direction of this AT WAR nation.
IMAGINE USA & PEACHMCD: I totally agree. Thank you for making your points.
Once religion becomes the weapon that advocates FOR war it blasphemes its own prophets, and that is WHAT we are seeing in all 3 of the major patriarchal “faiths.” The result? The rest of us, that is to say the full world population, is being dragged closer and closer to a veritable Armageddon. It’s INSANE! NO GOD would warrant the destruction of this magnificent creation based upon the Divine and conscious design of so many species and so many TYPES of human beings. ANY who try to associate the name, will or plan of GOD with such diabolical intention wreaks of the greatest sin(s). The problem is, thanks to TV and those channels that are quite capable of twisting, hypnotizing and mesmerizing minds, too many accept false credos and take them for religious fiats. Houston, we DO have a problem.
The day will come when ‘Starfish’ Bush does speak with God. I seriously doubt he will enjoy the conversation.
Hi Siouxrose, hey Kiddo, what happened to your post? (meri?)
I watched when Joel Osteen’s new megachurch was dedicated. Afterwards the ultra conservatives were in front of the camera proclaiming this a victory for God AND the political right, talking about how they will be better positioned to influence politics and Washington. When they brought Joel Osteen into the discussion about the victory for conservative politics - HE LOOKED LIKE A DEER CAUGHT IN THE PROVERBIAL HEADLIGHTS. He had no idea he’d been “had” by these people. I pray to the Almighty Goddess that he stays removed from politics and scandal, and that he turn these vicious hyenas in sheeps’ clothing away at the door.
Religion is an artifact of time and place— If the Southern Baptists had been born in Pharaonic Egypt, they would have known for certain that Aten, the Sun, was god and responsible for all—– etc,etc.
The finest of theological thought rises to the level of speculation—- the rest is just rubbish, and that applies to the certainty of athiests as well. All claim knowledge that is, simply put, unknowable.
The only thing I have received from the’religious right’ are death threats, demeaning consistant comments and harrassment towards my 17 yr old daughter who is Muslim. Her father is, as well, but he is capable of handling himself.
They are Turkish, and they are not particularly ruled by Islam.
Due to the illegal war in Iraq, it seems every other American considers Muslims terrorists and wanting to kill all Jews and Christians. A sad commentary on the intellect of the US people.
Wars are always proclaimed in the name of God, this is obscene. God, as far as I am concerned, would not be jumping for joy right now. The potential attack on Iran and plans in the works.
To have a choice of religion or to choose to have no religion is an individual choice, not anyone’s business to denigrate or demean these choices.
I am saddened by this constant state of war and to watch my child come home humiliated by the ignorance of the masses.
Constitutionally speaking anyone from any religious belief or affiliation who on a regular basis uses the airwaves to pontificaate on the need for the USA to defend and/or has a special obligation to defend or promote special policies towards a foreign religious nation and or group should be deemed to be violating the Constituiional rights of any and all American citizens.
While this may sound extreme or condemning it is not as disgraceful or religiously bigoted as some of the hatred of views expressed on networks such as VTN,CBN and others. To provide for a modicum of meeting minimumn Constituiional guarantees its incumbent on the FCC to provide outlest/programming for all religions and creeds that are practiced on this planet. With the proviso that the language used be English/American.
Just realised that I am composing a dictatorial piece. Must be the times were living in or the effect of the doomsday siren we are subjected to at noon everyother Wednesdays courtesy of Homeland Security.
We had all better think about the concept of collective guilt
peachmcd — “Congressional Prayer Breakfasts”?
– I didn’t know congress had Prayer Breakfasts. Are they decidedly Christian Prayer Breakfasts or non-denominational Prayer Breakfasts?
If I’m not mistaken, Buddhism, the discipline I espouse, is a ‘religion’. The dharma displays no interest in effecting change in the material world. It does not act as a political control device with which to garner and maintain power in an anointed few. Its sole object is the achievement of individual ‘enlightenment’ through the
practice of various principles in one’s daily life. The object of ‘enlightenment’ is the relief of the suffering that is inherent to the human condition.
Neither does it prohibit the exercise of other forms of spirituality. I, for example, am a pagan/animist as well.
I would, therefore, beg to differ.
God’s plan is working out. It may not seem like it on the outer surface of world affairs, but look at what’s happened, aside from the “hickup” of the Bush Admin now in office:
SALT-I agreement in Reagan’s term
End of Cold War
Rise of People power in South America and elsewhere
Unification of East/West Germany; fall of Berlin Wall
Environment becoming the #1 issue in the world now
…Yes, things are terrible. I know. But hope is about working towards the good, knowing deep down inside there is true potential for transformation.
“In spite of everything, I still believe people are really good at heart”
- Anne Frank
I think we’re on the verge of a new beginning. Economic/political reform and establishing justice through a more equitable distribution of food and resources on an international level will lead to an “economic miracle”, to use the term of the Global Marshall Plan.
http://www.globalmarshallplan.org/
The Bible does say in Revelation that secular governments(represented by the beast with 7 heads) will turn against false religion(represented by the harlot riding it)when least she least expects it. now that’s a consoling thought. No wonder jesus said in JOHN 18:36 “My kingdom is NOT a part of this world(doesn’t get involved in politics, etc). If it WAS.. my disciples(real christians) would have fought so I wouldn’t be delivered..” If fighting for Christ himself was not acceptable, what justification is there for waging wars etc for “christian values”? Like he said to those that ‘think’ they are ‘doing his work’ while violating his principles, in Mathew 7, “…I NEVER KNEW YE!”
All religions that insist on a belief in gods or ghosts are false.
Religion spoils everything
The religious right got little more than anti-gay and anti-abortion rhetoric from its elected officials.
But it got realities of war, torture, dismal environmental mismanagement, gross incompetence on mercy missions both domestic (Katrina) and abroad, nothing at all to help the middle-class, and nothing to help families (for instance, a shorter work week, paid maternal and paternal leave, single-payer health care, etc.).
The religious-right, it turns out, either got basically nothing — or else it exactly what its proponents (Robertson, Fallwell, Ralph Reed, etc.) and the other nuts had been hoping for all along. Either way, it turned out that Americans don’t really like torture presidents, and professing to be Christian lets one off the hook only so many times. They’ve shown their true colors.
THE snakehandlers are tired of being played like cigar box banjos by the republicans.where will all these religious bullies go for solace? what will become of all that anger -how and by whom will all that venom be directed-as chicken shit republicans join libs and all the rest of the enumerated “others” these folks have amassed over the years to provide themselves with an identity? one thing is for damned sure,these family values,christian right,toilet tapping repubs have mocked the living word of the lord jesus.that ain’t good fo’ nobody.is it?
Spirituality (not religion, but innate spirituality) DOES have a direct role in politics: Millions of humans starving to death in a world with an abundance of food is the greatest spiritual blunder possible. The spiritual recognition that humanity is one family, one race, one interconnected group, is what all true faiths can and should focus on.
So the idea of church separate from state is appropriate in the superficial sense, but the real “church” (the masses of people who long for basic human rights and to love each other as their self) can never be separate from our “state” (the political coordination of the distribution of these essentials for all humans, thereby allowing productive and healthy lives).
I don’t know if that made sense, but my purpose is to tie together the progressive secular world with the sincere religious truth-seekers. I don’t see any real difference between the sincere people working for change in both camps. Let’s stop labeling and get on with uniting and transforming our culture of death into a civilization based on cooperation, tolerance and sharing. You can’t argue with a die-hard evangelical. But you can find common ground with most rational Christians if you do so in a delicate way. At least that’s what I hope to do.
Nothing wrong with religion and prayer , its problem is when man[woman] starts interpreting it for the masses. there was some famous “lefty”, as these fascist like to refer to us that don’t drink their kool-aid,who said religion is the “opium of the masses”.Just remember Christ walked the world preaching Peace not this convoluted hatred that spills out of the mouths of these holier than thou types.When ever you hear someone talking about your sins, hold onto your wallet!
Vote for John Edwards for President 2008
Vote Democrat for Congress and Senate and let’c clean up our government
I am a Christian and Christians love one another. We don’t condone torture or hate.
Pray for our country, our troops wherever they may be and bring them home shortly.
Sharing=peace,
You speak of secular humanism, not religion. Starving people need title to fertile land, not conversion. It is the normal state of affairs that any people reach what is known as “carrying capacity” in relation to the productivity of land. Barring natural disaster, much of the world’s hunger and suffering can be attributed to human causation in spite of (or due to) religion. Landless and oppressed people don’t need conversion, they simply need title to arable real estate, free and clear, and to be left to their (natural) productivity.
sharing equals peace___ I thought your post made a lot of sense and if we had more people with that kind of attitude our country would not be in the mess it is in. Obviously, there are extremists in the religious groups and also in the secular ones that are causing most of the problems. The majority of our citizens would work for worthy causes if they had a chance, but seem to be busy defending themselves instead.
Our nation has developed such a poisonous rhetoric thanks to both sides that it is difficult to do anything constructive.
One’s religion, spirituality, viewpoint, etc. is okay as long as it isn’t pushed on others. Once it starts being pushed on others it isn’t okay. I think religion and/or spirituality is a personal thing but should only be shared with likeminded individuals or others interested in learning about it. Just because something is good for one person doesn’t make it good for others.
“Just remember Christ walked the world preaching Peace not this convoluted hatred that spills out of the mouths of these holier than thou types”
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”Matthew 10:34 NIV)
Religion does not belong in politics in our country.If people want or need to believe illogical things that have no proof in support of them it is fine with me - our Constitution guarantees freedom of religion….and freedom from it.
“Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the constituents.”– James Madison, letter to Thomas Jefferson, October 17, 1788 - James Madison, the “Father” of our Constitution
“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise.” Letter from James Madison to William Bradford, Jr. 1774
The God of the Old Testament — the God which Christians worship — Jefferson pronounces “a being of terrific character — cruel, vindictive, capricious, and unjust” (Jefferson’s Works Vol. iv., p. 325)
“I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition [Christianity] one redeeming feature. They are all alike, founded upon fables and mythologies” (Thomas Jefferson in a Letter to Dr. Woods)
VALIENT LEADERSHIP,
Our faith in Bush’s leadership and Devine guidance has been reinforced by his decisive action to protect us from such dangerous and important issues as gay marriage and flag burning. Our legislators may now dwell on these paramount issues rather waste their efforts on lessor items such as the war, homeland security, which he has so aptly demonstrated can be best pursued by his team without congressional or outside interference– and especially global warming which we now know is a conspiracy developed by the international scientific community.
For our safety, criticism of this administration cannot be tolerated, andmerits reprimand. This is why Bush had to expose Senator Max Cleland, a triple amputee Vietnam veteran, as unpatriotic-for supporting the dangerous inquiry into 9/11, as well as others who have challenged his policies
Although there is some evidence that the Pat Robertsons and Jerry Falwells of the world carry less influence,
everyone from centrists to the far, far, far, left must NOT relax yet. Liberals have not yet won 2008.
One of the things that many churches did in prior elections was make their membership rolls available as mailing lists. Getting these was a Karl Rove thing, and the Republicans STILL HAVE THOSE NAMES. You can bet that abortion and gay issues will again be front and center in wave after wave of political material, even without perhaps as much traction by the James Dobsons of the world. THEY STILL HAVE THE LISTS.
Hillary MAY be the Democratic nominee. The onslaught against her will be like nothing you’ve ever seen, and voices from the “religious” right will be as loud as ever, even if less listened to. The odd thing about that is that Hillary is a person of some considerable faith too.
To use one of the RR’s favorite words, “Hallelujah!” If the Religious Right is dying, I’ll gladly throw that first shovel of dirt onto the coffin. Hitory’s greatest injustices have been triggered in the name of religion.
My reading of the Religious Right is that tho they are “bible based” their 10 commandments all have qualifiers attached for the godly only of course. They can get you and the camel through the eye of the needle because that applies to everyone else but not them, they have been saved and all such rules don’t apply. Now with a few variations it applies to all the religious right of the Abrahamic religions. In this nation the leading lights all worship at Mammon’s feet but once you have been saved you can do whatever. I mean the IRS doesn’t threaten Dobson and his fellow charlatans with removal of their tax exempt status for pushing political candidates and parties, but for an inoccuous sermon an Espicopal church was so threatened, I guess there are christians and Christians.
I think this nation needs a dose of a theocracy, it claims to be a very christian nation so I keep hearing. Rule by the godly would bring us to our senses. Well its either that or a fascist guvmint or a dictatorship or a revolution. Take your pick, it is not going back to what it was, much less to its beginnings.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a bunch of nuds on a single thread. Religion is evil, period. If you want to babble on (pun intended) about the glories of paranoid schizophrenia, take it somewhere else.
Good riddance, now to repair the damage that they have committed.
Great article! Great thread!
I would like to add that everything that we see going on here is described in
2 Thess 2:
1Concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered to him, we ask you, brothers, 2not to become easily unsettled or alarmed by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us, saying that the day of the Lord has already come (BUSH APPOINTED BY GOD TO LEAD AMERICA). 3Don’t let anyone deceive you in any way, for (that day will not come) until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness (BUSH/CHENEY) is revealed (NOW HAPPENING), the man doomed to destruction (IMPEACHMENT). 4He will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.
5Don’t you remember that when I was with you I used to tell you these things? 6And now you know what is holding him back (TRUTH-BLOGGERS-PEACEMAKERS), so that he may be revealed at the proper time. 7For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who now holds it back (THE TRUE JESUS/MAHDI/MAITREYA, WHO INSPIRES THE TRUTH-TELLERS AND PEACEMAKERS) will continue to do so till he is taken out of the way. 8And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will overthrow with the breath of his mouth (TRUTH, THE WORD) and destroy by the splendor of his coming. 9The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders (9-11), 10and in every sort of evil (INVASION OF IRAQ, SHREDDING THE CONSTITUTION, TORTURE, ETC) that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved (”CHRISTIAN” SHEEP WHO STILL FOLLOW BUSH). 11For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie (PROPAGANDA ON TV AND HATE RADIO) 12and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
IN THE NAME OF THE PRINCE OF PEACE,
Carol Wolman
Purvis ames. In case you hadn’t noticed the subject is about religion. I suggest you take your own advice and take off somewhere else. Some mothers do have them.
sharing-equals-peace, if gods plan is working out, he must be one sadistic son of a bitch!
i just heard on pacifica this morning that the born-agains are considering running a third-party candidate because they can’t stomach presumptive nominee giuliani—at last, a point of agreement;)
While religions present complex phenomena, religion in the US has always represented a particularly virulent form, in part because the government is officially neutral but in actuality has generally been the vehicle of anglo imperialism, with non-anglo varieties reacting against or being co-opted by the drive to ‘christianize’ — i.e., turn into Jesus-praising flag-waving consumers — both its own citizenry and all unfortunates allied to it. This was Henry Luce’s project in building the Time-Life empire; and the anglo empire has always required an enemy. In the 19th & through the early 20th century, Catholic immigrants were the primary internal enemy, but they were integrated into the anglo project by the common front against socialism & communism & a sizeable number have signed onto the New Crusade, which they conflate with the originals and with the Battle of Lepanto.
I don’t know if the blogger who did the “Republican Jesus” cartoon is still active, but he captures perfectly the Prosperity, Power, and Persecution Jesus — the messiah who at once tells people they can achieve wealth, they need to exercise power, because they are always persecuted by the evil secularists. This doublethink — the ability to simultaneously exercise influence while believing one’s class to be victimized — is the source of right-wing power in the US, and it’s rooted in the historical psyche, of people who fled religious/ethnic persecution in Europe.
I don’t care if you need some religious fairy tale in your life to make everything bearable, just keep it out of my government! Honestly, religious people scare the hell out of me. They can justify anything by calling it gods will. Just ask Bush or Bin ladin. I prefer to take responsibility for my own life. The rest of you can go ask god for forgiveness if thats what it takes to make you all warm and fuzzy inside. By the way, the earth is older than five thousand years and took longer than a few days to evolve. Live people, this is it!
purvis I often feel the same way you do, but there is a lot of truth to what muggles5 said: what “religion” means to the evolution of human civilization is very complicated. Because “God” represents the unknown, the God idea and everything surrounding it holds our hopes as well as our fears, and is greatly responsible for progress as well as regress.
Another nail in the Religious Right’s coffin was George W. Bush. He discredited anything he touched, including Jesus.
No rational, self-styled Christian could possibly accept the notion that the God of the New Testament would condone a war of choice, much less actively endorse it. But many of the Religious Right enthusiastically embraced the idea.
Imagine: an individual who initiates a war of choice that is responsible for the death of 1.2 million souls and the displacement of another 4 million and who calls himself “pro-life”. The inconsistancy becomes apparent even to the brain dead fundamentalists.
My bumper sticker says it all for me:
“YOUR religion should GUIDE YOUR life - not CONTROL MINE!”
WMC: Exactly! And to the “list” we must add those ostensible “signs” of compassionate conservatism as witnessed in an abject disregard for the citizens of New Orleans, the DESIRE to relax laws so that “authorities” are FREE to TORTURE, a rape of social programs designed as a safety net for those not quite keeping up with inflation costs, and constant bail-outs of banks and corporations while laws are passed that GUT provisions on the part of civilians to argue for THEIR rights. AS if this is anything remotely connected with the cause or teachings of Jesus. Indeed, it qualifies as a massive collective state of schizophrenia of the spirit!
JIMMY T: I like that bumper sticker!
Abortion and gay marriage are personal or wedge issues at best which only belong in my pants and yours. Those who pretend to care for an embryo while at the same time watch like zombies when thousands of living and breathing Americans and Iraqis are killed for a lie are either hypocrites or plain dumb or both. Also, there are a lot more American fundamentalists than Taliban. Just look at your neighborhood. You’ll probably see one church in every block. Hate mongers like Rat Robertson preach to the fools and get rich.
Think about living and let live; think about health insurance for all; think about helping others rather than killing them and stealing their resources; and think about impeaching the warmongers. Think like a human citizen of the world. Perhaps then you may just find your God.
WmC: 1.2 million souls is just in the last few years. History clearly shows that more blood has been spilled in one of “GODS HOLY WARS” than for all other causes combined. Bush said he spoke with god before going to war.
“i believe we are all atheists, except you have one more god than me. when you realise why you dismiss all other gods, then you will realise why i dismiss yours”. steven roberts.
In one way or another, God has always spoken to His messengers or prophets. It suddenly dawned on me what apparently has not occurred to anyone else yet: BUSH IS A PROPHET, because he has said that God told him to attack Iraq.
Is it possible that in the conversation he had with God he misspelled prophet with profit?
But seriously, I wish someone would ask him for God’s exact words, like,” George, go attack Iraq. There’s oil in them thar hills.”
a recent post consisted of a quote attributed to gandhi. it bears repeating:
“i do not like your christians. they are so unlike your christ.” i’ve been spreading that one around.
Dichterfreund: I beg to differ. In fact, religion in the United States has been more diverse, and given more scope for free exploration, than in any other place or time. The proliferation of groups with incredibly diverse theologies is unprecedented, with little government interference (at times there should have been more, as rights of vulnerable people were being violated). It is simply ahistorical and uninformed to claim that religion is a more reactionary force here than in other places. In most of the world, religion is more explicitly tied to regressive forces, while there is also dissent and progressivism in these places.
The Quakers, the Amish, the Catholic workers, the Sojourners crowd, the left wings of the denominational churches, the Sanctuary movement, the coalition of Jews, Christians and academics that spearheaded the Freedom Riders movement… these forces are unknown in the rest of the world with the exception of Buddhists in some places. Religion historically in the US has been associated as much with the left as with the right. it is only recently that the religious right has figured out how to assert itself as the one true voice of God.
If you want to rail against religion, fine, freedom of speech is more important than the feelings of believers. Separation of church and state - speaking as a Christian, I’m all for it, the government and the church screw everything up, and can only do worse by being in alliance. Want to talk about the violence and bigotry espoused by the church over the centuries, I am in perfect agreement, though the church has no monopoly on this, it seems to be sadly a human compulsion in almost every time and place.
But please, if you are going to vent about something, take the time to learn about it. Precisely because the right is claiming a tie with religion, and most Americans are believers of one sort or another, it is crucial for the left to get this right. We can’t afford to lose the struggle for justice for much longer, the stakes get higer and higer all the time. and you simply are not going to change the body politic of this country by dismissing the beliefs of msot of its population. To believe that you can is dangerous fantasy, too much is at stake for our children and grandchildren.
Peace
Ken Hymes
Well, it’s about bloody time! Hey, presidential candidates, did you hear that? You can quit the smarmy TV testimonials of faith.
Maybe now we can restore a bit of sanity to the public discourse.
“i believe we are all atheists, except you have one more god than me. when you realise why you dismiss all other gods, then you will realise why i dismiss yours”. steven roberts.
A religion of more than one is a conspiracy.
ezefyler, good one.