The media has been a blaze with news reports of Xtians launching hate campaigns across the nation. Not just your usual everyday Xtians, these are pastors – leaders of flocks, men of God, and followers of Christ.
Of particular note are these:
May 2, Pastor Sean Harris of NC, tells his congregation to beat their gay children until they turn heterosexual. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTiBv99MYDk
May 25, also in
June 5, Rev. John Hagee (the same reverend John McCain originally courted and won the support of in 2008, then dumped) called for atheists to leave the country because we are hated and are bringing it down. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75b1FMzGTB8&feature=youtu.be .
And most recently on June 8 Pastor Terry Jones, of the Koran burning debacle which resulted in riots and death across the middle east and endangered our service people, lynched an effigy of President Obama from a gallows in front of his church (see pic above). http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/06/08/lynched/
A friend asked my opinion of what was going on. Why this sudden spate of hateful rhetoric from the pulpit? Was this venomous rhetoric in place of preaching God’s eternal love and kindness some kind of inexplicable epidemic that has infected the preachers of the “Prince of Peace’s religion”?
Hardly, I explained. This is simply the norm amongst the most devout purveyors of Christian kindness. That it is so readily observable is attributable to the internet’s and Youtube’s sharpened view of what otherwise would have been just fuzzy local events. These messages of hate, violence and intolerance have been preached from the pulpit and readily accepted by enthusiastic Christian sheeple for time immemorial. It is just less overt than the Christian inspired mass violence of pre 21st century practitioners..
“Wait a minute.” My friend interrupted. “Christianity is all about love, exemplified by the sacrifice God made for us. Jesus said ‘Those who are without sin should cast the first stone.’ He said ‘Judge not lest ye be judged.” He said ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself.’... What these men are saying isn’t at all what Jesus had in mind.”
And of course he’s right, but not in the way he thinks. If Jesus ever existed, what he had in mind was freeing
What these good Christian pastors are doing is precisely what the “good book” tells them to do. Oh selectively to be sure. After all, it’s much more convenient to justify and promote God’s endorsement of retribution for those you already hate, and for beating your children, and promoting the extinction of homosexuals, and the expulsion of heathens who don’t share your delusion, than it is to endorse his rule against wearing mixed fiber clothes and not eating Shrimp Creole.
Nah, it’s not an inexplicable epidemic of mass hatred infecting Christians. It’s simply true Christianity conducting its business as usual... exposed to the world by modern technology.
Eventually the veil will be totally lifted, the pretext dropped, and some enterprising pastor will have bumper stickers made and distributed to his congregation with a time honored, if unofficial motto:
“Christianity – Sowing Hate, Embracing Ignorance & Killing with Kindness for Almost 2000 Years.”
I'll buy 4 of those bumper stickers when you get them made up....one for my car and one for each of my banjo cases~~
ReplyDeleteI will just use one of my comment's I used on facebook which I think is a fitting one for this article: The path to religion is the path to insanity.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the comment Pastor Sean Harris and Pastor Charles L Worley, I have little doubt that these Xtian hate campaigns would be coming from every corner of the Xtian community if it were not for the fact that it has become socially unacceptable to ridicule or spread serious contempt for gay people. Instead, in an attempt not to be seen as bigoted or homophobic, well organized churches and lobby groups now resort to much more sophisticated arguments to spread their hate. I don't know what is worse. At least no one takes the rantings of the likes of Fred Phelps seriously, and his campaigns are probably counter productive to his cause in that he polarizes more people against himself than converts new supporters.
ReplyDeleteI can only imagine what it must be like to be an atheist in some of the more religious parts of the USA but here in Australia I don't think comments like those from Rev John Hagee would go down too well. Generally, when our popular sports people, media personalities and even our Prime Minister declare their atheism it barely registers as a blip on the radar. Attitudes to atheism are more positive here but that is not to say that there isn't that pocket of the Xtian community that would have us all rounded up and sent to a concentration camp.
The other factor that's fueling the hatred even more is the fact that our president is black. A friend of mine came back from a trip to the South recently and told me that racism is not only alive and well down there, it's not even stifled in the least.
ReplyDeleteAnother trend I'm seeing now (kinda unrelated) is that the more the old testament's ridiculousness and violence is exposed out there for all to see on the internet now (thank you, Leviticus!), the more christians I hear saying that the OT is irrelevant and essentially ignored. Half of their holy book is irrelevant?? "God's word" is no longer followed?? How dare they.
Hahahahahahaha!!!
ReplyDeleteEXACTLY what I've taught my free-thinking children and my Xitan friends and co-workers for years now! Hump....you really know how to break an issue down into small, (easily digested), bites for the brain-washed among us.
My mother asked me years ago, (cue the hysterical voice), "If you aren't going to teach your children that they have a GOD to fear, what will you tell them to make them decent people???". I replied, "Mother, how about I tell them that they don't want to HURT other people with their actions, because they wouldn't want to be hurt by others?". She was silent for a few seconds and said, "Huh....I guess I hadn't ever thought of that.". Why is it that so many religious people automatically associate Atheism with bad behavior or immorality?
I feel, (my opinion from just looking around for the last decade or so), that I am FAR KINDER TO MY FELLOW MAN, MORE LOVING and LESS JUDGEMENTAL than ANYONE I know who proclaims their, "Godliness". Hmmmmm. Wonder why that is? :)
NB
Jones changed his display when he felt the heat http://youtu.be/EcX4FprspAA
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