Comments on: Take Back Jesus

By: Joe

Joe — Thu, 26 May 2005 02:45:03 +0000

Does anyone remember the Church of the Kidnapped Jesus from Vonnegut’s novel Slapstick? I’m gonna have to go back and reread that book.

By: Kerensky97

Kerensky97 — Mon, 23 May 2005 22:55:25 +0000

“Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: “‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’”

The Bible said that? The more I learn about the bible the more I like it. It’s ironic that God and the Bible are the antithesis of the Christian Conservative.

You’re absolutely right, Christians need to take back their religion. The Religious Reich is giving a good thing a bad image.

By: Joe

Joe — Mon, 23 May 2005 19:05:20 +0000

Brian, the strange thing about Oklahoma is that it has been one of the last states outside the Northeast and the West coast to succomb to far-right religious and political ideology. We have a Democratic Governor, and this is the first year the Republicans have controled the state legislature in thirty years. Remember that Tulsa, surprisingly, is the most right-wing part of the state, and while people in Oklahoma City maybe dumber, they’re not necessarily as ignorant and cruel.

just sticking up for the homestead.

By: Jewels

Jewels — Sun, 22 May 2005 05:58:08 +0000

All I have to say about this matter is that those who are true Christians don’t have to tell you that they are. You will know it by their character. Meaning, they live by the truth of judge not lest you be judged by the measure that you judge. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. Jesus led by example. I know that in a “perfect” world it would be great if everyone could just get along. But obviously we don’t. So that’s why we all need to pray that we will get the right people in the white house regardless of his or her personal agenda.

By: Richard

Richard — Sun, 22 May 2005 03:30:35 +0000

briantologist, while you may be right that Christians from the ‘I worship an apparent sociopath God’ school of Christianity aren’t in the majority ( & I don’t use Robertson or Falwell as litmus tests for the Christian mindset…..I mean seriously, the $$$$$ signs in their eyes & the subtle cash register KA-CHING that echoes around their broadcasts kind of gives away the identity of their real God) still someone voted our little poster child for impeachment president into the Oval Office again & it damn sure wasn’t my agnostic little ass.

By: briantologist

briantologist — Sat, 21 May 2005 17:19:39 +0000

Richard, while Christians of that stripe are not atypical, they’re not the majority — they’re just the most vocal and organized branch, and therefore the most visible, unfortunately. They’re closer to a majority in shithole states like my own (Oklahoma), but on a national level it’s more the case that Christianity has been hijacked by bigots with a political agenda.

Concluding that all Christians are fundamentalist assholes because people like Pat Robertson are so visible is the same as concluding all Muslims are fundamentalist assholes because of Osama bin Laden and those who believe like him. The problem that people who actually follow Jesus’s teachings have is that doing so is a lot less noticable than using the Bible to publicly bludgeon homosexuals.

I’ve heard it said that this very problem will cause a schism within the Republican party, splitting votes between fundamentalist assholes and fiscal conservatives. On a related note, I’ve started noticing bumper stickers with sentiments like “I voted against Bush because I’m a Christian,” suggesting at least the beginnings of an anti-fundamentalist backlash (fingers crossed).

By: October

October — Fri, 20 May 2005 16:53:56 +0000

Greg,

Can we start by not sugar-coating what these people are?

Calling them ‘conservatives’,'Christian conservatives’ or ‘evangelicals’, etc. is a misnomer.

They are radical republican extremists. The proverbial wolves in sheeps’ clothing and false prophets all rolled into one. They are facists hiding behind the banner of Christianity.

Labeling them anything else only gives them cover.

By: Becky

Becky — Fri, 20 May 2005 13:39:52 +0000

I am no longer a Baptist because I didn’t see them following the teachings of Jesus, feeding the hungry and clothing the naked. I’ll say it again, it’s a sad day when the godless liberals are better Christians than those who spend all their religious energy getting high on Jesus (no matter what they call themselves).

By: Richard

Richard — Fri, 20 May 2005 03:47:11 +0000

Interesting post but I’m not exactly sure that the numbers of Christians who disagree with the radical right’s agenda is all that large. They seem to give folks a varied menu of hate/fear to choose from. If you’re expecting a groundswell of rational Christians to ride over the ridge, like the Lone Ranger, & save the day….ummmmm….I wouldn’t hold my breath if I were you.
I happen to work with mentally retarded folk and my job attracts large numbers of fundamentalist Christians who think they’re doing the Lord’s work…….right about up to the point when they have a large pile of bm heaved at their heads by a client in the middle of a behavior.
But anyway, as an example of the mindset of fundamentalist Christians, I had a supervisor who spent just about everyday that we worked together trying to save my soul. He constantly told me how God loves me & he would never do anything to hurt me & on & on…..
He was never very convincing, primarily because it became apparent, quite early, that he’d never read the Bible from beginning to end. But one day, just out of annoyance, I said to him, ‘Well, what about these gentlemen here? Sitting around all day staring into space, filling their diapers while people talk to them in a babified sing-song….Do you seriously think these guys have anything even remotely approaching a life? What kind of love filled God would do this to someone He loves?
Without missing a beat, he said, “Oh that’s easy, there’s some kind of sin in his family….maybe his father or his great grandmother, & God is just punishing them for that sin.”
This, I’m sorry to say, is not atypical.

By: Ereshkigal

Ereshkigal — Fri, 20 May 2005 03:07:18 +0000

One can be a “conservative” Christian (which may have either social or theological connotations), an evangelical Christian, or even a fundamentalist Christian without concurrently endorsing a totalitarian mission. (I wholly reject the term “lunatic” because of its negative implications for persons with mental illness; my job entails working for the rights of these individuals, and not a one of them deserves to be linked to any oppressive religious-based aggressors.)

I follow the lead of Hendrik Hertzberg and others in using the adjective “Christianist” to identify those who create a cult of religious dogma to promote a hostile, rigid, and elitist political agenda.