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TechnoratiUS Soldiers in Afghanistan Told to "Hunt People for Jesus... So We Get Them into The Kingdom"
Military officials at Bagram are caught on tape urging US soldiers to evangelize in the Muslim country.
New video evidence has surfaced showing that US military forces in Afghanistan have been instructed by the military's top chaplain in the country to "hunt people for Jesus" as they spread Christianity to the overwhelmingly Muslim population. Soldiers also have imported bibles translated into Pashto and Dari, the two dominant languages of Afghanistan. What's more, the center of this evangelical operation is at the huge US base at Bagram, one of the main sites used by the US military to torture and indefinitely detain prisoners.
In a video obtained by Al Jazeera and broadcast Monday, Lieutenant-Colonel Gary Hensley, the chief of the US military chaplains in Afghanistan, is seen telling soldiers that as followers of Jesus Christ, they all have a responsibility "to be witnesses for him."
"The special forces guys - they hunt men basically. We do the same things as Christians, we hunt people for Jesus. We do, we hunt them down," he says.
"Get the hound of heaven after them, so we get them into the kingdom. That's what we do, that's our business."
The translated Bibles appear to be the New Testament. According to Al Jazeera, US soldiers "had them specially printed and shipped to Afghanistan." On the tape, one soldier describes how his church in the US helped raise money for the bibles. Al Jazeera reports that "What these soldiers have been doing may well be in direct violation of the US Constitution, their professional codes and the regulations in place for all forces in Afghanistan." The US military officially forbids "proselytising of any religion, faith or practice." But, as Al Jazeera reports:
[T]he chaplains appear to have found a way around the regulation known as General Order Number One."Do we know what it means to proselytise?" Captain Emmit Furner, a military chaplain, says to the gathering.
"It is General Order Number One," an unidentified soldier replies.
But Watt says "you can't proselytise but you can give gifts."
Trying to convert Muslims to any other faith is a crime in Afghanistan. The fact that the video footage is being broadcast on Al Jazeera guarantees that it will be seen throughout the Muslim world. It is likely to add more credence to the perception that the US is engaging in a war on Islam with neo-crusader forces invading Muslim lands.
Former Afghan prime minister Ahmed Shah Ahmedzai told Al Jazeera there must be a "serious investigation," saying, "This is very damaging for diplomatic relations between the two counties." Sayed Aalam Uddin Asser, of the Islamic Front for Peace and Understanding in Kabul, told the network: "It's a national security issue ... our constitution says nothing can take place in Afghanistan against Islam. If people come and propaganda other religions which have no followers in Afghanistan [then] it creates problems for the people, for peace, for stability."
A US military spokesperson, Major Jennifer Willis, denied that the US military has allowed its soldiers to attempt to convert Afghans and said comments from sermons filmed at Bagram were taken out of context. She said the bibles were never distributed. "That specific case involved a soldier who brought in a donation of translated bibles that were sent to his personal address by his home church. He showed them to the group and the chaplain explained that he cannot distribute them," she said. "The translated bibles were never distributed as far as we know, because the soldier understood that if he distributed them he would be in violation of general order 1, and he would be subject to punishment."
The video footage was shot about a year ago by documentary filmmaker Brian Hughes, who is also a former US soldier. "[US soldiers] weren't talking about learning how to speak Dari or Pashto, by reading the Bible and using that as the tool for language lessons," Hughes told Al Jazeera. "The only reason they would have these documents there was to distribute them to the Afghan people. And I knew it was wrong, and I knew that filming it ... documenting it would be important."
The broadcast of this video comes just days after a new poll of White Americans found that, in the US, church going Christians are more likely to support the use of torture than other segments of the population. The Pew Research Center poll found: "White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified - more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did."
This is certainly not the first scandal where US military forces or officials have been caught on tape promoting an evangelical Christian agenda. Perhaps the most high-profile case involved Lieut. Gen. William Boykin, who was a Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence under Bush. Boykin was part of Donald Rumsfeld's inner circle at the Pentagon where he was placed in charge of hunting "high-value targets." Boykin was one of the key U.S. officials in establishing what critics alleged was death-squad-type activity in Iraq.
In October 2003, Boykin was revealed to have gone on several anti-Muslim rants, in public speeches, many of which he delivered in military uniform. Since January 2002, Boykin had spoken at twenty-three religious-oriented events, wearing his uniform at all but two. Among Boykin's statements, he said he knew the U.S. would prevail over a Muslim adversary in Somalia because "I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol." Boykin also charged that Islamic radicals want to destroy America "because we're a Christian nation" that "will never abandon Israel." Our "spiritual enemy," Boykin declared, "will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus."
As for President Bush, Boykin said, "Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this." In another speech, Boykin said other countries "have lost their morals, lost their values. But America is still a Christian nation." He told a church group in Oregon that special operations forces were victorious in Iraq because of their faith in God. "Ladies and gentlemen, I want to impress upon you that the battle that we're in is a spiritual battle," he said. "Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army."
Watch Al Jazeera's report here.
94 Comments so far
Show AllIs this a way to draw the Taliban from Pakistan (since they hate other religions being taught in their country) to hunt them down and kill them?
Jan.1, 2009 Cal Thomas wrote that Viva Viagra was the best war weapon. But when CIA officials gave out Viagra pills to Afghan Tribal leaders they used the wives as sub human sex objects to reward an Afghan Leader for pointing out a member of the Taliban." Make love not war Thomas wrote gleefully.It's better than waterboarding" Many of the wives were forced to marry and many were under age and rape of a wife is allowed.This CIA method may be torture for the girls or women. The main thing that fundamentalists have in common is their subjugation of women, especially the Catholics with their ban on birth control and abortion even to save a woman's life. I understand even the Muslim's allow a woman an abortion to protect her health. Does this coincide with the Pope's visit to the Muslim world to talk about their common discrimination of women? Knowing how much the Taliban hate other religions being taught, is teaching the bible a way of torturing them or bringing them back from Pakistan to Afghanistan to hunt them down and kill them?
The US government wouldn't police this if it could and couldn't if it would. The point is yank the troops out of the Middle East, close bases around the world, bring those kids back here and separate them from their military hardware. Then they can espouse any idea they want.
GI Joes on their own warped Jihad? Jihad Joes...? Sent by the Penta-goon, obviously...
"may you live in interesting times"
like the devil at the start of goethe's faust, i decided to check in w/the Old Man a few weeks ago at Easter Sunday, see what was brewing at the House of the Lard. went to an episcopal church just up the street, was enjoying the introductory music, and started reading thru the program, and at the end there was a "prayer of thanksgiving" for the military "protecting our freedoms" in iraq, praying for security, courage, etc., etc., comfort for the families of the wounded soldiers, etc, etc. (apparently gawd is unconcerned w/iraqi families.)
very angry, i walked out. so much for my 5 minutes w/jeebus.
most of "xianity" in the US is worship of the State.
"if jesus came back & saw everything going on in his name, he'd never stop throwing up"-hannah & her sisters.
These Evangelical Christians would be damned mad if Muslim Fundamentalist's tried proselytizing to them on their airbase. It has to be one of the many objectionable practices coming out of their religion. I can't imagine any sane person becoming an Evangelical Christian. I try and discourage these people from ever coming to my door here in the US. Not only because their religion is offensive. But, I feel I have the right to my privacy and space without obnoxious people like them invading it. It's way to late to try and bring me to Christ. That ship sailed years ago.
There are many disgusting examples. Another that I recall was Franklin Graham, son of the Reverend Billy Graham, going to Iraq and promising potable water to Iraqis who would be baptized.
Somehow, this religious stuff makes all of the killing palatable, I guess. Chris Hedges' book is "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning," a kind of war exegesis.
In addition to religious diversion, the troops are told many lies. They're "fighting for our freedom," but it's completely false. I guess you believe it or kill yourself. Belief becomes a form of survival, especially given the twisted reality of having to sustain illegal, immoral and unjust wars.
The troops need to read some Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn and just refuse to do their missions (what a loaded word in this context). Stop following orders.
-TIA
TIA,
your comment "Belief becomes a form of survival, especially given the twisted reality of having to sustain illegal, immoral and unjust wars." created a flood of images in my mind of disillusioned germans in 1945/46.
a conquered people who refused to confront their delusions of grandeur until it was too late. 10 years earlier, the pride and exuberance of nazi germany was broadcast the world over, happy white people w/ smiles. but after the war -
i have a difficult time seeing fundamentalist christians (many of whom endorsed torture in recent PEW polling) coming to terms w/ their phantasmagorical illusions that suposedly enhance their lives.
rarely are fundamentalist christians forced to see their victims in the same light that they see their congregations in (thanks to MSM blackout). the good germans were forced to witness their transgressions after the war. when will christian american fascists ever be in that position ?
...peace...
These military personell will (if they make it back) again live in the US in their cult mentslities. They'll have guns for sure, they'll be god-crazier-than-ever, PTDS'd, addicted. Neighbors will be shocked at each mass shooting to come.
Christianity has a history of killing people who fail to convert. The Native Americans suffered that fate and now the Islamic people of Afghanistan are facing it. A strange kind of hatred fills the Christian soul.
Very true.
Christianity has had particularly devastating effects, especially with its tendency to form alliances with state power. That's been the case ever since the Roman emperor Constantine embraced Christianity at around 320 A.D.
Some say it is the "Abrahamic" religions that are the problem: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. All either were spread by the sword, or they enforced tribalism and violence against their neighbors.
Religion can be neutral (although there is plenty of violence in the Bible). Religion can be a force for good. However, human history has mostly shown religion to be a force of repression, hostility toward the other, and - in some cases, out-and-out genocide.
-TIA
Here is the thing about people that hide the lord or invisible christian they hide there light. Jesus says to be a light unto the world those who hide there christianity have it coming to them when they get to heaven all they can say is "I made it to heaven." Good but what did you do with your time on earth. mainly to sum all this up they suck as christians my friends are either on fire for God or not christians at all.
There are no Visible Christians in the USA.
There are though those whose 'Christianity' is Invisible. Manifest only in a personal behind closed doors relationship with Christ via prayer. Jesus preached kindness to widows & orphans, he preached a simple message of Love. Those who shun church's insanity but quietly seek Good through Prayer deserve no hostility. They have Zero relationship to the very Visible perverters of Christ's good teachings. Gandhi praised The Sermon On The Mount.
Where Jesus said to LOVE Your Enemies and THOU SHALT NOT KILL.
To Love, Faith, and Hope.
On Starting a New Religion
A plug for my newly minted religion. The philosophy is still in the developmental stage, but do feel free to join up.
On Starting a New Religion
http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/5-16-2006-96342.asp
There are no Christians in the USA, only FAKE CHRISTIANS.
The evangelical soldiers showed how the military was (is?) off its mission. The mission was/is to take out Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. If our military can't carry out its mission because it gets sidetracked into things like proselytism, we need to turn the battle over to other military forces that can do the job. Perhaps our forces could play supporting roles that don't involve interfacing with the natives.
I regret that the people of Afghanistan, like most people in the world, are afflicted (as I see it) by religious beliefs that among other things justify torture and execution for apostasy, conversion, homosexuality, adultery, etc. But education, law, and diplomacy should address these problems, not the military.
Mark Twain wrote an essay at the dawn of the 20th century called To The Person Sitting In Darkness. Speculating on the advisability
of continuing to extend "the blessings of Civilization" to the Far East and the Philippines, he wrote:
"Shall we? That is shall we go on conferring our Civilization upon the peoples that sit in darkness, or shall we give these poor things a rest? Shall we bang right ahead in our old-time, loud, pious way, and commit the new century to the game, or shall we sober up and sit down and think it over first? Would it not be prudent to get our Civilization tools tools together and see how much stock is left on hand in the way of Glass Beads and Theology, and Maxim Guns and Hymn Books... and Torches of Progress and Enlightenment (patent adjustable ones, good to fire villages with, upon occasion)...."
It was a good question to ask a century ago, and we are still waiting for an intelligent answer
Thank you. Mark Twain also wrote his absolutely germaine "The War Prayer" during the Philippine-American war. According to one Twain biographer, Twain, asked if he would publish it, said, "No. I have told the whole truth in that, and only dead men can can tell the truth in this world. It can be published after I am dead."
RIGHT WING FUNDAMENTALISM HAS DELIBERATELY INFILTRATED ALL LAYERS OF THE GOVERNMENT AND CORPORATE RULING CLASS,
and has been doing so since at least the 1930's.
You can read Jeff Sharlet's "Jesus killed Mohammed: The Crusade for a Christian Military" at
http://www.rigorousintuition.ca/board/viewtopic.php?p=260335&sid=c11cce97ce33090df5f7e07dd71fdffd
(You can't see it online directly from Harper's)
But also try to pick up a copy of Jeff Sharlet's 400 page book, "The Family." In 1934, a minister named Abraham Veriede was desperate to find a way to fight labor, the New Deal and Communism. He was especially upset by the San Francisco general strike, and the Teamsters in Seattle. His inspiration was to recruit "key men" in government and industry to form small group "prayer cells," who would meet regularly to pray and fight the left. By 1953, when the Republicans regained power, the "Family" or the "Fellowship" was strong enough to institute the President's National Prayer Breakfast. It now includes dozens of senators, and contacts with dictators all over the world.
My question is: has the Left invented a social device as strong as a "prayer cell?"
"My God is bigger than your God"?
The military is mentally defective not because it recruits high school drop outs but because the top brass have a grade school mentality of what is going on.
They think they are playing soldier in their command centers. No privates in the field have such illusions.
"George Bush was placed in the presidency by God"? Apparently God is getting old. His judgment is not what it once was.
I agree about the drop outs I see that every day, but George Bush was placed in presidency by God and it was a good thing. In the bible it says to fallow the laws of your land and to listen to the leaders in command for he wiil appoint them.
Nuts. Bush was placed into office by a flawed decision by the supreme court; god had little to do with that. Bush's reign of error was not in any way a good thing; your nation is bankrupt - financially, spiritually and in matters of influence. The editors of the bible stuffed that notion in that you should obey the authorities - since the priests are working for the elite it's not much of a surprise that such an exhortation is there.
God is a figment of your imagination.
"God is a figment of your imagination"
Well we shall see!
In the event that I'm right we won't see anything will we?
In the event that I'm wrong, I can honestly say that I'd rather be damned than go to heaven with the likes of the sunday brigade. I would much rather burn forever than have tea with Jerry Falwel, Pat Robertson or the myriad number of catholic priests who were forgiven for buggering little alter boys, or shacking up with the woman of the week. I can't and won't be taken up to any heaven that excludes the billions of people who lived before jesus is said to have walked the earth. From what I've read in the bible, God is the biggest psychopath who ever existed. No, the god of the bible is fiction, nothing more.
That chaplain should be drummed out of the army. How presumptuous. So, every American soldier is a Christian, and that "brand" of Christian? If that is any example, I would think less of anyone who claims to be a Christian.
Creating endless ways to make new war means creating endless ways to make a lot of money.
Failures of Intelligence has reaped the Militarization of Christianity
"The Crusade for a Christian Military: Jesus Killed Mohammed" by Jeff Sharlet in HARPER'S May 2009 edition is a chilling clarion call regarding the entrenchment of Christian fundamentalism in the USA military beginning during the Cold War that accelerated during the Vietnam era which has wrecked havoc on the very soul of our nation.
Fundamentalist [referred to as evangelical by Sharlet] Chaplains began to join the military in droves as they aligned themselves with the Industrial Military Complex in opposition with Catholics and mainline moderate Protestant denominations such as Methodists, Presbyterians, and Episcopalians who were of one voice speaking out against American terrorism in Vietnam and for following in the ways of the nonviolent Jesus.
“Starting in 1987, Protestant denominations were lumped together simply as “Protestant”; moreovr, the Pentagon began accrediting hundreds of evangelical and Pentecostal “endorsing agencies,” allowing graduates of fundamentalist Bible colleges—which often train clergy to view those from other faiths as enemies of Christ—to fill up nearly the entire allotment for Protestant chaplains. Today, more than two thirds of the military’s 2,900 active-duty chaplains are affiliated with evangelical or Pentecostal denominations."
"Everyone but Christians understands that Jesus was nonviolent."-Gandhi
The rest:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1267&Itemid=219
Eileen Fleming, Author, Founder WAWA:
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Producer "30 Minutes With Vanunu" and "13 Minutes with Vanunu"
eileenfleming,
this same phenomena occurred in guatemala - one sect (protestant) aligning itself w/ unscrupulous homicidal thugs.
excerpts from...
ANTIPAS ~ A CIA FRONT -- By Barbara Aho
http://watch.pair.com/antipas.html
{The rise of El Verbo Church elder, Rios Montt, to President of Guatemala in 1982, the terrorist operations of his regime and his support among leading U.S. evangelical ministers are documented in the Public Information Research Database file on Gospel Outreach:
"Gospel Outreach is an evangelical Pentecostal church with headquarters in Eureka, California and Guatemala. It grew out of the 'Jesus People' movement of the 1960s in the United States. . After the 1976 earthquake, 28 Gospel Outreach evangelicals from California arrived in Guatemala to help rebuild the country and establish El Verbo church.
"An early convert was General Efrain Rios Montt, who became president after a military coup in March 1982.
"According to the Latin American Institute of Transnational Studies, 'Within the first nine months of Rios Montt's administration, 12 evangelical pastors were assassinated; 69 were kidnapped; 45 disappeared; 15 were jailed; 11 foreign missionaries were expelled; 88 evangelical temples were destroyed; and 50 more were occupied by the Army.' By 1986, Verbo Ministries reported 250 congregations. Verbo Ministries also runs a Leadership Training School with over 1000 members directed by Rios Montt himself. . .
"Rios Montt has been supported by Pat Robertson (Christian Broadcasting Network), Jerry Falwell (Moral Majority, Thomas Road Baptist Church, Liberty Federation), and Loren Cunningham (Youth with a Mission). They have worked with the Florida Cuban community. . . Jimmy Swaggart Ministries has provided financial support for the schools of El Verbo in Guatemala. This is done under the ‘Programa Ayuda Infantile,’ a branch of the Swaggart ministry.” 30.
Pat Robertson's organization funded Gospel Outreach to help Rios Montt build ‘model villages’ for the Guatemalan peasants. These model villages were, like the Jesus Movement, “based on ‘communitarianism,’ a system of church-centered community ownership of property that vaguely would include private ownership of homes and land.” 31. Gospel Outreach’s fundraising arm in the U.S., International Love Lift, was able to raise $1.5 million for Rios Montt’s program. The authors of Thy Will Be Done: The Conquest of the Amazon: Nelson Rockefeller and Evangelism in the Age of Oil, describe the fruit of Gospel Outreach – which turned out not to be model villages, but a genocidal campaign that was perpetuated largely because of Evangelical funding and petitions to President Reagan:}
...peace...
Sioux Rose
EILEEN: Thank you for the post (and your continued efforts)... it's STUNNING information. I can't think of anything more diabolical than ANY religion teaching people to hate and justifying KILLING as a projection of God's will. Like Vox said, it needs to be classified as a mental illness.
It has long seemed to me that "teaching people to hate and justify killing as a projection of God's will" has always been a, if not the, primary purpose of religion. What frightens me is that these "chaplains" and soldiers will someday be coming home, and I don't doubt for a moment that one of them would happily gun down an old atheist like me.
Just what those people need, more ignorance and more religion!
"What these soldiers have been doing may well be in direct violation of the US Constitution, their professional codes and the regulations in place for all forces in Afghanistan."
Where ya been, Al Jazerra? That crap ceased existing 'round 03...
Now shut up and do what Jesus tells ya, or we'll blow you up... again...
And Jesus said unto him...
"Thou shalt build thy pipeline thru the lush opium fields..."
I will not set foot in a church to hear a minister preach in this country till they all start preaching the evils of war and start teaching the constitution in bible school.
I pledge to protect the constitution of united states of America, for it is my bible, and without it I am not a free thinking spiritual human, nor an American.
I am not a spymerican, warmerican, torturemerican,or a Godmerican.
I AM A CONSTITUTIONAL AMERICAN.
I have been victimized ,tortured and followed 24/7 for 2.5 years by gangstalking right wing religious lunatics.The new stazi police are here, and they are mean and ugly.For they practise torture.
Once you have been tortured by Jesus freaks , you dont want to set fet in a church because of the evil it promotes using the name of God.
And , I now know for sure, they are not better people because they claim to be Christians.Far from it.
Born Free Men
A message for my 24/7 stalkers that follow me while I try to earn a living driving 125 plus miles a day, if if you dont like the way I drive,blame the freaks that tail gated and tried to drive me off the roads for year one of your torture campain.
God said they're going to be killing thinking they are doing him a favor. This is not necessarily limited to any one Religion, People's or Nations. What they sound like are the Religious Political Pharisee's spoke about saying to them they would travel a 100 miles to find on "Convert" then turn them into a Child of Hell 1000 times worse than they. Christianity like all Religions seek "Converts."
Where some may differ are like the Seventh Day Adventists who considerd the U.S. govt to be the Beast of Revelation when the big land swipe was going on. The Adventists didn't stop what was happening but they related events to the prophecies of the Book of Revelation.
The difference was the Adventists didn't make those things happen so they didn't give any "Spiritual Yes" to what was happening then. If the U.S. was or is the Beast of Revelation then the Aventists by saying, No, weren't worshiping the Beast & the Image of the the Beast.
Or the Yes & No of Things.
Many prophetic researchers also consider the U.S. may be Mystery Babylon?
Life is good. What an experience! It's always best to forgive.
As a peace loving Christian, I strongly detest this kind of religious "manifest destiny". Real Christians would never go out of their way to spread their religion. Trust me.
If that were true, why did Crist say to his disiples to spread the gospel to all nations?
Jesus' gospel was "love thy neighbor as thyself". At least, according to the gospels.
I don't recall Christ telling his disciples to spread hate disguised as "gospel" to all naions.
Where did you get that? Look in the Bible, Christ said to spread the Gospel.
Christ, if he really existed at all, was crucified at least sixty years before the first gospel was written...so htf did he tell people to "spread the gospel"?
Real Christians would live the kind of life that would be an testament to Christian Ideals. There is such an animal (I've even met one or two), but it is very rare.
I think that there are more of them but most are afraid to show themselves for it. Since the more aggressive ones are more dominant in terms of being the most visible compared to the peace loving ones, this is probably why I'm not as religious.
Funny issue about missionary work.
In the Episcopal Church's history, the large numbers of Africans who were brought into the Church over the last century, are significantly more conservative than those in the USA.
The larger collective collaboration and consensus -- is now being "held back" in some manner ( from its desired more progressive and inclusive policies, e.g. Gay issues ), because of this missionary anchor of the past.
It's funny ( to me ) that the old missionary position, is interfering with modernization of sexual preferences.
Namaste
This is why I'm not so religious despite my being a Christian. I'm not a fan of missionaries and have known a great deal of them to be hideous and even violent.
This seems ok. The Afghans are now in possession of all the relevant facts. Armed crackpots with dopey haircuts represent the religious culture of the current invader, which also kills and tortures Afghans. Yep, that's us all right.
We've got them right here in our own communities, though they are not allowed to carry weapons and we are able to get restraining orders to keep them off our property and away from our children - an option not available to Pashtuns. The only reason they are scary is because they are both loony and numerous. Since they are in no danger of selling their hokum to anybody outside the Bible Belt, I sort of think that little circle jerk in Baghram is the best place for them until evangelical Protestantism can be officially declared a mental illness.
Hunting with the 'Big White Jesus'?
The blonde, non-jewish, fair-skinned one who speaks English and drives an SUV?
"The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts." - John Keats
Sioux Rose
MUJERIEGO: Good one. Thanks for the laugh! Sometimes it's necessary medicine!
US Soldiers in Afghanistan Told to "Hunt People for Jesus... So We Get Them into The Kingdom"
This just about perfectly describes the level of intelligence in the United States. The Afghans will never be converted. Their country will never be subdued. The shuffling, tongue-tied Gringo, with his vacant, thousand yard stare and short-short memory, is once again going to learn the hard way.
Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition!
The U.S. military is just practicing on the Afghans.
Wait till they try this stuff on the Americans...
I'm sure Jesus is pleased.
Conversion at the point of a gun? This is how the Spanish made slaves of native Americans.
King Leopold's Ghost stalks the night again. Right out of Chinua Achebe's "Things Fall Apart".
This is the evil triad of the Missionaries, the Merchants and the Military.
Sioux Rose
HUMBABA: I had the same image come to me. (I hadn't read your post when I posted it.) Amazing isn't it, that this shit has lasted so many centuries, and it's always justified using God's alleged name?
These are top predators using their bible as a weapon. Guns, bibles, cultural blindness and propaganda. What a horrible mixture.
"...the center of this evangelical operation is at the huge US base at Bagram, one of the main sites used by the US military to torture and indefinitely detain prisoners."
Sounds like they have their own little Crusade setup there. Wonder how much time is spent covertly trying to convert the prisoners while torturing them for terrorist fairy tales?
Speaking of soldiers, on this date almost forty years ago-May 4, 1970-U.S. soldiers shot 12 students and killed four others. Another blot on the First Amendment and the United States of America.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-OmZvyNrzAs
Just following orders. "You've got to be carefully taught." That would include Bible School lessons.
Deepa
This reminds me of America's crusade in Philippines.
The American history is filled with its sacred missions in the world. One of them was to Philippines.
William McKinley, then US President explained:
"I went down on my knees and prayed to Almighty God for light and guidance more than one night. And one night late it came to me: 1) That we could not give them [the Philippines] back to Spain — that would be cowardly and dishonorable; 2) that we could not turn them over to France and Germany — our commercial rivals in the Orient — that would be bad business and discreditable; 3) that we could not leave them to themselves — they were unfit for self-government — and they would soon have anarchy and misrule over there worse than Spain's was; and 4) that there was nothing left for us to do but to take them all, and to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them, and by God's grace do the very best we could by them, as our fellow-men for whom Christ also died. And then I went to bed, and went to sleep, and slept soundly, and the next morning I sent for the ... War Department map-maker, and I told him to put the Philippines on the map of the United States (pointing to a large wall map), and there they are, and there they will stay while I am President!"
The President described the combination of sadistic cruelty and starry-eyed self-adulation as a noble campaign to ``uplift and civilize and Christianize" the Filipinos. “Civilizing” and “Christianizing” the Filipinos took longer than McKinley thought. This noble campaign brought out the brute in the soul of the US Christian crusaders. A frustrated US General ordered troops to kill every Filipino male over age ten. The righteous American Christian warriors succeeded in their campaign by overcoming local resistance forces through their overwhelming superiority in weapons and sheer ruthlessness. They slaughtered about half-a-million Filipinos within the next few years. The American media explained that it would take patience to overcome evil, and bring liberty and happiness to the Filipinos.
One critical citizen satirized McKinley's war: "G is for guns/ That McKinley has sent/ To teach Filipinos/ What Jesus Christ meant."
Read about American Evangelical Proselytization in Iraq and Afghanistan:
http://www.aljazeerah.info/News/2009/May/4%20n/Evangelical%20Proselytizing%20Continues%20in%20Afghanis...
"Jesus killed Mohammed: The crusade for a Christian military" By Jeff Sharlet
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/05/0082488
Sioux Rose
DEEPA: It's a White Christian thing... (not that the Jewish Zionists of Israel haven't taken on similar tactics lately). Ever read about the way the Indigenous of North and South America were treated when they refused to "convert" as the boatloads of European settlers and explorers arrived?
Maybe that's where "gunboat diplomacy" began. This idea that torture leading to conversions makes for faithful followers. Forget about setting an example in decency and grace that others willingly wish to follow. I believe in reincarnation and it's clear that these patterns are deeply etched into mass consciousness. Much of their essential formation began by and through religious programming. Seeing the same disgusting behaviors articulated again today in my view is evidence of a great many minds being held hostage to "old gods." Until a complete disconnect is established between religion/spirituality/the claim to speak for the Divine and any urge to kill/destroy/torture/dehumanize other, the darkest components of human nature will find ways to take up arms and destroy civilization for the rest of us, that is, the awakened souls who are consciously seeking to evolve and grow and work on the ways and means to live peacefully together. It is a battle between the Light (love) and the dark (fear/hatred).
JESUS, at the occasion of his second coming, is immediately surrounded by crowds of Christians of every sect. Righteous Pat Robertson pushes through the crowd, hands Jesus a microphone and says "Jesus, speak to us, your loving followers." To which Jesus responds: "What part of You're all Gods Children don't you get?"
From the article:
"People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back (torture)."
Is this the height of irony, that the unchurched are more scrupulous about the Golden Rule than the ostensibly religious?
Perhaps one's moral sensibilities exist independently of, or are even compromised by, one's belief in his or her own eventual redemption.
Sioux Rose
JETHRO: I noticed that, too. I guess it indicates that they can think for themselves, but what a castigation of religion that it intensifies the belief in punishment to the point of accepting, enthusiastically! the torture of other, all for a "good" cause. After all, God wants them to do it (I am being facetious).
This reminds me of the crowds that cheered as women were burned as witches by the all-seeing, ever-compassionate church. And someone posted on CD that the Catholic Church was probably the originator of plenty of torture devices. When people are given the false belief that their actions are supported by "god" many take that for a free pass, and it sets loose THEIR inner demons.
Least likely, but still 4 out of 10. 40%.
Sioux Rose
RFLOH: Probably the same percentage that views porn, oh, ye who thinks there's nothing wrong with that form of desecration of the female/feminine. A society that suffers from depraved indifference by entering a moral vacuum where pain and pleasure are no longer discernible, and the humanity of the individual ceases to matter, can justify anything. For all your obvious intellectual acumen you sure miss the forest for the trees on this one! (This goes back to the Frank Rich article posted a week ago.)
Making any person an object for any reason is harmful. That includes all the advertising on TV. In a way, it's all porn.
This is a war for G.O.D... Guns... Oil... & Drugs...
These soldiers and chaplains are useful idiots for the resource wars...
Of course they must adorn their raping & killing with a crown of thorns...
It makes sense when one considers that the esoteric initiation rites of the mystery schools (Yoshua) became Bastardized by the roman empire into a death cult glorifying the torture and murder of the one & only Son Of God by the State... Sending a chilling underlying message to everyone in Christiandom that "you don't fuck with EMPIRE"... Dare challenge the existing power structure and you will be humiliated and murdered like a common thief...
This myth has been intentionally misinterpreted or altered in dangerous ways... By having Jesus be able to take away your sins is a simplistic justification for harmful actions in the past or present... Jehovah, the Babylonian god of war, has been confounded with Yahweh, YHWH, the Ein Soph, the Tao of western Gnosticism... The very belief that God sent his son to die for our sins before we were even born... strips individuals of their sense of free will, autonomy, and individuality... And violates the core principles of other spiritual knowledge systems like karma & divine balance... And having folks go to heaven for ever and ever if they obey and behave like the rest of the flock, and the rest of the heathens be damned to eternal hellfire ideology reinforces the "Us vs. Them" war mentality and reduces life to one lifetime, what ever station you were born into, you must endure Being poor or killing for Jesus til you die and you will be rewarded in heaven... The Heaven/Hell duality model also short-circuits the idea of reincarnation, a major tenet in other schools of wisdom, which like Karma, was bleached from the Old testament writings...
Sioux Rose
GOLDEN MEAN: Thank you for bringing in the esoteric component.
There are two deep and profound ironies: First, this idea that KILLING will win converts, that it has anything remotely to do with Jesus.
Second, when Bush made the Freudian slip that we were involved with another CRUSADE he was not exactly joking. Tony Blair and Bush, as born again Christians probably DO believe in a holy war, an Armageddon. Their minds are so twisted by a military perspective that they probably think God really wants to see the world divide up into teams that fight to the finish to prove who's got the strongest sense of fealty. It's as if there's been NO evolution of consciousness at all. I've often argued in this forum that the Age of Aries, that ruled by Mars, led to beliefs about an angry, jealous father God. When Jesus arrived, the time was ripe for a new belief system for mankind, one that integrated the Divine feminine through emphasizing traits like empathy and compassion. Ultimately the old warring ways were maintained, the only difference, the NAME of Jesus was attributed to the new and evolving conflicts.
I read about the military and its Christian prosletyzing on Truth-out, too. This is NOT an isolated event. And many churches told their congregants to vote for Bush, that Bush was a man of God, and this is one reason why so many from the White Protestant (authoritarian!) fold(s) see no disconnect with torture. They are so thoroughly convinced that this particular conflict is designed by God and that allegiance to it is proof of fealty. These demonstrable behaviors on the part of MILLIONS explain why I return to the premise that MARS, god of war, rules, and all the talk of Jesus (except on the part of the Initiated of Spiritually mature, like Dorothy Day, Father Dear, and Dorothy Day to name a few) is really just the extremely powerful and hypnotic PR probably begun by the likes of Carl Rove.
When ANY religious denomination begins to talk about DEATH to other, it blasphemes the very nature of true worship of the Infinite. The ONLY 'god' this twisted distorted behavior serves is Mars, and that's why the military has an interest in keeping "the faith" alive. Young persons who don't question authority make good soldiers. And if they think they are giving up their lives for a religious ideal, all the better. In my view, they are not unlike the Islamic suicide bomber... and both ARE promised rewards in another lifetime. One gets the presumed virgins, the other "heaven" which may in fact consist of the same image in the mind of the Christian who has undertaken a more covert suicide mission, all for the love of Bush/bombs, but hardly Jesus. Who will tell the people?
There seems to be some force that allows so many humans to follow these junk religious cults. Call it Mars or Aries. I wish the age of Aquarius would hurry up and get here!
Sioux Rose
GEORGE: It can only be born through us: that is, there has to be a critical mass of enough persons waking up to a different understanding. The individuals who have met and continue to meet for The World Social Forum get it. That ANOTHER way is possible, and given the facts of global warming and the US trafficking in horrific weapons, the time as you put it, needs to hurry up! We are in the transition now, the spin cycle on the cosmic "washer" as the old stuff is getting churned up and if enough persons say--as some did on a different thread--they no longer GRANT their consent, psychic energy is removed from these dangerous forms, behaviors, and established bastions of power.(i've explained the astrological cycles that indicate this transition phase in a number of previous posts, so I will not repeat myself. Some take offense at this information. Ironically what I find obscene doesn't seem to bother them in the least.)
Hensley, I have news for you and the rest of your wacko Bible thumpers, examples speak louder than words and you are setting the kind of example that few would want to follow. You people are not anything but pseudo-christians, actually a church cult that is a tool of the MIC otherwise; you would not have military access, because if you were real Christians, you would be against war and torture.How come you do not love your enemies and protest wars like REAL CHRISTIANS do? John Lennon:"Imagine there is no countries, it isn't hard to do, there is nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too". What gives you self-righteous hypocrites the right to hunt down Muslims to convert them; than the right of fanatic Muslims the right to hunt down you and convert you to their religion! John, you were right on!
This issue is also covered quite extensively in the May issue of Harper's magazine in the article entitled Jesus Killed Mohammed: The Crusade for a Christian Military by Jeff Sharlet.
I do beleive there is another way of looking at this. Soldiers know that the war isn't and can't be won militarily. They know that they're wasting lives by being there. They're also smart enough to know that pulling a stunt like getting an idiot priest to talk like that on camera, and packing bibles from home, is not going to play well in the muslim world. In fact, the story might just be enough to get them home sooner than Obama is going to get them home. Of course the above is pure speculation. Entirely wishful thinking on my part.
It's obvious you haven't had much experience with "born agains", or religious fanatics of any kind, for that matter.
I've had my share, but they're not quite as fanatic as they are down south. And when I meet up with one, I generally pre-empt the discussion on religion by saying 'the holy spirit is satan in drag.' Once you blaspheme the HS you're unsaveable, saves tons of pointless debate. Of course if they're persistant I voice my opinion that Jesus Christ blows goats, and that the only true god is coffee. (evil grin)
Years ago I actually debated them using their own holy books to poke hole after hole in their own arguements, then I realised that it's nothing more than engaging in a battle of wits with the unarmed...
I've had the same experience. I was called the devil incarnate by one poor newly converted lady, because I could quite more scripture than she could. Now I just cross the street whenever I suspect a fundamentalist is coming towards me. As for my family, they know better than to engage me in argument. They all agree that taking care of my Mom and other similar actions speak louder than words anyway.
I have, and the faster we can get them to meet their maker the happier I will be.
Yes, the happier I will be too because I do not want to be around for what is about to happen to this world.
Poll's often lie or are slanted to give credence to a particular viewpoint. So I wouldn't get quite so gleeful about another secular attack on Christians.
If the part about instructions to our troops to proselytise the Christian religion to Muslims by a military chaplain is true, the man should be court martialed. This has no place in the military.
Another secular attack on Christians? What dimension do you live in?
One in which a large percentage of Christians think they torture for God. That's nothing new, though, is it? Missionary work and "White man's burden" have hung out together for years, even though they are not mutually necessary.
Darn George.....do you miss the consistent secular attacks on Christianity? I live in this dimension not some fantasy dimension.
Sorry, Tom. I live in a family of fundamentalists. Most if not all of the attacks I see are by fundamentalists on gays and abortionists and those not properly indoctrinated. Thats the dimension I live in.
You are missing the point about the poll.
Even if you omit the (white) Evangelical Christians, 4 out of 10 of the non religiously affiliated supported 10. Throw in the fact that most Americans are Christians You have a poll here indicating a pretty large group of Americans who believe that torture is justified. Maybe even a majority.
rfloh
Good point....but they must have hit a bunch of fundamentalist if you ask me. I know quite a few Christians (could be territorial) and very few believe that.
But your point is valid.
Writing from a viewpoint of strict fairness, Islam also is an evangelizing religion.
That white Protestants are foolish enough to try this in a place such as Afghanistan bespeaks more of their narrow and uneducated worldview that is eerily similar to Muslim fundamentalists. In my perfect world, I would have both plopped on to a desert island and let them have at it without the rest of us being harmed by their stupidity.
Actually, Islam is not an evangelical religion--at least not in the up front way that most Christian sects are. We do not, for instance, corner people on buses or sidewalks passing out phamplettes. Most phamplettes, oddly enough, are located inside Masjids entrances for visitors to peruse. Even the most fundamental Muslim you can find isn't going to be brazen enough to slip a Qur'an into your non-Muslim hand and try to "save" you. People come to Islam, Islam doesn't tend to come to them. You want Islam, you got to find it, we're not going to bother if you don't care.
Regarding these guys spreadin' the word, I thought Islam was supposed to be the religion that gets spread by the sword. If these guys really want to save some souls, instead of trying to convert them with Bibles and ammunition, they should show them some cash and improved living conditions courtesy of their "savior". As was done with the "savage African nations" by the oh-so-helpful evangelical humanitarian movement. As Harry Belafonte sang,
"One night I was walking down Fred'rick street
Poor and hungry, no shoes on me feet
I passed a door that said "Down with sin"
It was the smell of food that pulled me in"
- Insurgent
Amen. You might add Mormons and Catholics in the mix, and lets not forget those Black Baptists who are so against gay marriage. Make it a rather small island.
Writing from a viewpoint of strict fairness, I don't think Americans would like it either if Afghans invaded the US and tried to convert people from behind a rifle.
The preacher will never propose such an idea as "strict fairness" to the congregation. It's too humanist. It's too challenging to authority.