Also a great cover for a group hate that has nothing to do with Christmas. As for St. Augustine, I was taught in my Catholic school that his mother prayed for him constantly. He was living with a woman without benefit of marriage. When she became pregnant, he suddenly found God! When I asked the nun if leaving a pregnant woman behind was the right thing to do, she said that God's calling was the more important. She wasn't happy when I said that it seemed awfully convenient to me. Still does!

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Warning: Bitterness and disgust ahead, christians sure to be offended. Don't say I didn't warn you.***

Let's see, christians are oppressed because they haven't yet been able to force their religious beliefs down our throats. (Poor christians, even as the majority religion, they still can't seize power.) They're oppressed because we won't let them rule the country based on their b.s. superstitious beliefs - yeah, I said superstitious. (Who needs separation of church and state anyway? Let's vote by the book!) They're oppressed because they can't make women go back into the kitchen and churn out a baby a year for the glory of their god. Because you know that women are nothing more than vessels for the seed of man.

But it's coming. It's not enough that they want to keep same-sex couples as 3rd or 4th class citizens, or that they keep our youth ignorant of basic biological facts regarding sexuality, or that they are busy making it much more difficulty for women to obtain the birth control that will limit the incidence of abortion (which we all want to reduce, contrary to what the christians would have you believe). And don't even get me started on the dumbing down of science instruction with their transparent "intelligent design" creationism. Can you say, "Here we come, third world! Move over down there at the bottom!"

Each and every one of these holier-than-thou hypocrites ought to have to swear on a stack of their bibles that they've never had sex without the express purpose of making a baby. Lightning bolts, anyone?

I was raised a christian, but it didn't take me long to figure out what a b.s. racket the whole deal is. My animosity is founded in experience with the hypocrisy and unchristlike behavior of the people who want to consign everyone else to the fiery depths or force us to live by their beliefs at the point of a sword. If that's christian love, I want no part of it.

A war on christians? Bring it on. They've been warring on the constitution and non-christians for too long. Strangely enough, I'm having a hard time finding tolerance in my heart for the most intolerant of us all. Until christians start putting the teachings of Jesus into practice, I will have nothing but contempt for their "do as we say, not as we do" bullshit.

**Message edited by poster to eliminate the profuse profanity that poured out during the original writing of this post.

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Well, he's a perfect poster child for the christian hypocrites. Sin away, do whatever you want. Just as long as you repent sometime before you die, your god will forgive you, and you can basically do whatever you please until then.

Sound familiar?

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I think I smell an attack on our government by the extremists of faith. They should not do this. They are the recipiants of government support. Money given by the religionist to their faith based causes is tax deductible. Assets of the religious are not taxed. Will they surrender these perks? Do agnostics have the same gift rights or must they adopt a new god?

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What fun!! CHRISTIAN-BASHING!! It's all the rage, and no one can accuse you of being anything but enlightened!

Judging from the comments above, your readers don't seem to understand that there are millions of American Christians who don't agree with George W. Bush or the lunatic right. Nah, we're all lumped in together as The Great Big Stupid Enemy.

Prejudice is scary no matter where it's coming from, and bias is always the fool's first resort.

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"Judging from the comments above, your readers don't seem to understand that there are millions of American Christians who don't agree with George W. Bush or the lunatic right. Nah, we're all lumped in together as The Great Big Stupid Enemy."

Well if what you say is true, then why aren't you "millions of American Christians" fighting the hate-mongering and bigotry of the christian radical right? Where is your disgust of these homophobes and what are you doing to stop them?

Actions speak louder than words. So put up or shut up.

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If the Christian god has a heaven that will allow all kinds of behavior to occur and have all the "crimes" forgiven as soon as you repent, then this is not the place I wish to spend all eternity for the following reason. You people can enjoy the company of the likes of John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Daimer, and all the others who suddenly found God before execution. Those are souls I don't care to be around. What about you? Let me know if I've gotten the concept wrong, but I believe that is supposed to be the power of redemption that is the main selling point of Christianity.

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For me the religious right represents the crossing of the Rubicon that forms the boundary between harmless superstition and violence and hate fueled by supernatural snake oil.

According to the Revealer: "'The War on Christians' conference is coming to D.C., featuring a modified-A-list of conservative heavyweights organized by Vision America, including Alan Keyes, Gary Bauer, Sen. John Cornyn, Phyllis Schlafly, Sen. Sam Brownback and Rep. Tom DeLay, as well as some Jews..."

Doubtless the anti-Semitism of Dominionist/Rapture eschatology will be glossed over in flourishes reminiscent of Fred Phelps. I suppose they had to default to Alan Keyes as their token black since Lawrence King isn't available, despite the latter being more typical of the Dominionist religious right wing.

With enlightening, pre-enlightenment panels like "The Judiciary: Overruling God, and The Gay Agenda: America Won't Be Happy, these Crusaders come to DC to stand up for the rights of the downtrodden 77%.

I, at least, am holding out hope it won't be a rehash of Mussolini's march on Rome, though I'm not holding my breath to find out whether their belt buckles have "God with us" embossed on them. Clerical fascism is not new, though perhaps they're trying to revive it as something of a fashion statement. It's relatively clear they don't believe in it, with all the "Tradition, Family, Property" and other propaganda stunts in Latin America.

And Jews joining the idiocracy? Well, take a gander at the list and you'll find a handful of less-than-mainstream Jews lending their names to the cause. Start with Rabbi Aryeh Spero who campaigned for anti-Semite Pat Buchanan and who breaks bread with another Jew-hater, Bill Donohue. The folks here lend about as much ecumenism to this conference as Zell Miller lends to a bipartisan panel.

Such self-hating Jews, while not particularly common, are not tremendously difficult to find. There's an entire tradition of Revisionist Zionism centered around such idiocy. They've done a number of nasty things they'd rather people forget, such as the Transfer Agreement, which prioritized their own proclivities for fascism and the establishment of a Jewish state above the lives and welfare of their religious compatriots.

On the homepage is a quote from St. Augustine, a libertine without equal, who only renounced the flesh toward the end, giving his life to Christ and writing: "Without God, I can't; but without me, God won't."

«To Carthage then I came, where a cauldron of unholy loves sang all about mine ears.»

Anyway, of course Dominionists love St. Augustine. He devised the notion of a "just war" and furthermore inspired the Calvinists with all sorts of predestination quackery that served the purposes of class warfare quite well. Indeed, "economic Calvinism" is a central component of Dominionism.

Innocuous enough. But we have a certain fondness for Augustine too. So we'll play. How does this sentiment sit with a group that supports Bush, a man with an apparent fondness for being the conqueror: "The people who remained victorious were less like conquerors than conquered." (TheRevealer)

I'm not particularly fond of Augustine. His ascription of deicide to the Jews has historically been a significant motivator of their persecution (and indeed, the Jews involved here should know that likewise). Furthermore, his anti-humanist doctrines have been more harmful than anything else, even his anti-Semitism.

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After declaring war on the less holy and less pious than thou, (I didn't know I was in a war until the evangelicals told me I was) the evilness of Christian leaders is as easy to see as the juvenile arguments of a playground bully tattle-telling on a kid that fought back.

For example, "Happy Holidays" is from marketing departments of large retailers that want to speak to ALL of their customers, not just the Christians, and is NOT for the vaporous "political correctness" fairy. And frankly, just because it is Christmas time, I still go to the store for toilet paper, not because I'm Christmas shopping. Add to this, not all customers are shopping for Christmas presents and not all customers need to prove their Christianity by buying useless consumer stuff in a hedonistic ritual of gimmee gimmee. "Happy Holidays" just might be referring to more than one Holiday, which most likely has not occured to the self-centered Christian view.

The overwhelming size of the Christian population in the U.S. that have the freedom to worship all they want in their own home, church or mind, are forcing others to worship with them, by shoving public displays of their worship into every aspect of society, like education, the workplace and government. They can pray to themselves all they want at school or work, but are not satisfied until they wear it on their sleeve to make sure they are getting credit from the club.

After years of suffering from the aggressive tactics of word-mincing and twisting by evangelical evil, a few folks that read the Bill of Rights resisted. The enraged (supposed)Christians retaliated with vengence and brutality, and complained when the rape victim fought back.

And that would make Jesus puke.

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RAISED AS A CATHOLIC, I WAS TAUGHT TO NOT QUESTION CHRISTIAN DOGMA. THEN I GREW UP AND TOOK CONTROL OVER MY THINKING. SOMETHING NO ONE SEEMS TO DISCUSS ARE THE ATROCITIES THROUGH THE CENTURIES BROUGHT TO US BY THE INQUISITION (MURDERING JEWS AND MOORS) AND THE EVER NOBLE (?) CRUSADES, IN WHICH YOU LIVED I9F CHRISTIAN AND DIED IF NOT. SOME OF THE MOST CRUEL OF TORTURE DEVICES WERE CREATED BY "CHRISTIANS.

THE BOOKS OF MATTHEW3, MARK, LUKE AND JOHN WERE WRITTEN AND REWRITTEN AT LEAST 200 YEARS AFTER JESUS WAS CRUCIFIED (FOR BEING A RADICAL ANTI-WAR
PRO-PEACE ADVOCATE). WHAT NONE OF THESED SUPPOSED
FOUNDERS OF CHRISITANITY MENTION IS THIS: JESUS WAS BORN A JEW AND DIED AS A JEW. THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH WAS NOT FORMED AT THE BEGINNING OF HIS DEATH; NOTING WRITTEN DURING CHRIST'S TIME MENTIONS THE FACT HE NEVER CALLED UPON HIS FOLLOWERS TO GIVE UP JUDAISM BUT RATHER TO LIVE AS THE TORAH OUTLINED. NOR COULD ANY OF HIS EARLY FOLLOWERS READ OR WRITE, SO HOW IS IT WE FIND THESE FISHERMEN ELOQUENTLY DESCRIBING JESUS' LIFE?

RELIGIONS ARE BUILT ON FEAR AND POWER. THE GREATEST FEAR FOR CHRISIANS, AS SMUG AND INTOLERANT AS THEY ARE, IS WAKING ONE DAY TO FIND NOT THE "RADIANCE" BUT THE WRATH OF WE WHO ARE SICK OF THEIR HYPOCRISY, GREED, WAR-MONGERING HATRED AND ADORATION OF A PRESIDENT WHO SHAMELESSLY COURTS THEIR VOTES. THE CHRISTIAN IDEAL IS FAST BECOMING NAZI FASCISM WITHIN OUR ONCE FREE COUNTRY.

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Yes Virginia, there ARE some good Christers out there, along with Santa Claus, but they are just too few and far between. I don't know about the rest of you but I've had it. My new motto, along with ITMFA, is going to be BREED MORE LIONS!

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How does a progressive justify hate speech? There is way too much of it here. (Well, ANY is too much.)

Are you seriously talking about hating, hurting and killing people because of their faith? Do you realize what company you are in when you do this? Do you kiss your mother with that mouth? You are behaving exactly like the people progressives supposedly to oppose. You are being irrational, reactionary and violent. It turns my stomach.

Evan has a valid point about the extreme fallacy of the 'Xtianity under siege' mentality. Xtianity is well established, and practicing, professing Xtians are very unlikely to suffer meaningful negative consequences. In fact, the amount of social networking that occurs inside churches provides such an enormous benefit, one is tempted to feign faith just to get in on the goods. But that's where it ends.

There is no call for the kind of slavering hostility I see above. It's barbaric and reprehensible. It's just plain evil. You should be ashamed of yourselves, ashamed to call yourselves progressives. I'm ashamed of you, that's certain. You want things to get better? You could start by showing those different from yourselves a little respect.

That's all.

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