If the Constitution claims there MUST be a separation between church and state and that everyone has freedom of choice and religion - HOW can these fundy moron wastes of oxygen/DNA/evolution possibly justify what they do without being un-American and anti-constitutional?

Oh yeah - they want to take over the world so it's all nice and shiny and clean when Jesus comes back, because heaven knows - Jesus would never want to come back before his Chosen Dickheads had taken over.

When confronted by reason, Christianity must use force to maintain itself.

Given choice -- or in other words, free will -- Christianity evaporates.

One of the points to the DeVinci Code, the book is that Jesus was a natural man with a wife and fathered a child who when to live in southern France. That fact alone could destroy The Far Right. I have spent the last month reading about what I found in the DeVinci Code. Holy Blood/Holy Grail is a good read on what was found in the DeVinci Code, even though its authors did not win their law suit against Dan Brown.

Margret Starbird has published some well documented books around the early church and how who Jesus was distorted. Her belief that until we restore women to an equal partners in marriage, which equal rights; Men will continue to self destruct. This has nothing really to do with religion and more to do with individual spiritual belief. The Eastern Religions understand the ying and the yang and the belief that personal enlightenment comes out of balance relationships between male and female energies. This was Jesus true message of love, taking care of those who need help and balance in all things. He was not a God and he said he was not a god. He was a man with human needs and desires. The Church made him a God.

I am not a christian, but a pagan that believes in Mother Earth as a living being and a balance between man and female energies on this planet. I fear the far right and one only has to read a little of Christian History between 1200-1400 to understand what happens when the Church wins. It will take all of us to change what is happening, just as this articles says. It is an excellent article with a good balanced view of our political situation now and what we can do.

Evangelical Christans are united by their misery, not love. They are consumed by "sin" and find it easier to project ionto an external figure to relieve their inner anquish and self loathing rather than take the path of self awareness by letting go pride and ego as a means to achieve humility and embrace all other people. That is the essence of practicing Christian prinicples and this they decidedly do not do. Evangelicals are sadomasochists who gain relief and pleasure only after experiencing the misery and torment that is part of their daily lives. The classic example is Mel Gibson who views any identification with Christ from the viewpoint of physical and relentless beatings and humiliation. This punishment is felt as deserved on some level by evangelicals but outwardly is expressed as blaming someone for their suffering. Gibson blamed the Jews, evangelicals blame all those they consider not one of them. This brings them immense relief and pleasure. And those motivated by inner guilt and misery with an equal measure to punish and take revenge on "others" can be quite destructive, until they turn upon themselves. And the will.

America's success in keeping religion from taking over our government has been due to strong leadership from the nation's social and intellectual elites in government and industry.

We don't like to admit that we have an elite class, but we do, and they have played a key role in maintaining some degree of sucularity in our government. Now those leaders have been bypassed by the Republicans' very successful grass-roots strategy, a trend that is fueled by today's high-speed communications.

Unfortunately, those grass roots tend to be very conservative and very religious, so religious that they are perfectly willing to dispense with church-state separation.

This is a very dangerous trend. My bag isn't packed yet, but I would suggest keeping a close eye on Supreme Court decisions and be prepared.

Unfortunately for those of us who scoff at biblical bullshit and the fanatical extremists who spout the divisive gibberish of "christianity," the climate of fear currently permeating our country creates the conditions for manipulation of those gullible enough to believe such fantastical nonsense. So long as people run scared religion will do a thriving business.

I'm an evangelical Christian who is appalled by the right-wing "Christian" nationalists. In gratefulness to the free salvation from Jesus, I want to follow his teachings. "Love your enemy" and "Love your neighbor as yourself" leave no room for governmental coercion, including war.

Jesus (and the rest of the Holy Bible) are strong on active compassion for the poor and oppressed. Is that what the religous right practices?

The Bible teaches care for the earth. Christians who miss this are missing a major message.

The Bible teaches that God shows his love for us by Jesus dying for us sinners. Jesus' followers are to follow his example in sacrificial love - for sinners (which includes ALL of us humans.) Those who are not acting in love are not acting as Christians.

Evangel means good news. What is being described in the article is not good news. The way to confront the religious right is with the truth of Jesus.

The way of Jesus is the way of peace. See Bible Pacifism.

It isn't terrorism that will bring us to our senses. It will be environmental catastrophe.

We are going to have to change and change rapidly if we want to survive as a human species. This means letting go or changing some of the beliefs we hold as sacred now and replacing them with beliefs based on surviving and living in harmony and peace. Sounds crazy doesn't it? Harmony and Peace.

The outrageous belief of rapture is not going to serve us any more than the 17 (or however many) virgins belief will. Who makes up this stuff? It is fatalistic and void of our taking responsibility for our all too human behavior. Sorry but it is not "those others" who are the problem. It is all of us who are collectively destroying the earth. We can understand this if we take the religious blinders off and look at things as if they were meant to be in balance.

Are we really that ignorant that we think the incredible gift of the real eden - our planet home - was ours to destroy so we could have an ultimate war of the fools? Are we going to let these religious radicals destroy the earth?

There are millions of people who are not afraid of taking responsibility and are making changes now to reverse the disastrous course these religions have put us on. Evolution in human thought will have to take place because these destructive religious beliefs cannot be part of future solutions.

Religions have failed to include the planet in their doctrine and dogma. The false belief that we are somehow chosen by a God-man (created by us in our image) over all other species is ridiculous. The arrogance of thinking that we have some sort of ultimate rule over the earth is bringing us to the brink of disaster. Our denial of our interdependence in the web of life will have to change if we want to survive.

Extreme religions will not survive. They won't be able to make the needed changes.

Whether the transition is done well or will be dangerous and destructive evidence of our hubris and ignorance is up to us.

And it lives here, among other places:

Sojourners

The right has no monopoly on the Divine, unless we let them have one.

Ultimately, a fight against Christian nationalist rule has to be a fight against the anti-urban bias built into the structure of our democracy.

Liberals should work to abolish the Electoral College and to even out the composition of the Senate, perhaps by splitting some of the country's larger states.

Both of these require a fight on the national level, not on the local level that Ms. Goldberg recommends as the solution. It was the imbalance of representation she cites that worked to put the religious right in control. The same strategy won't work for a miinority concentrated in underrepresented urban areas.

Our only hope is that the Christians aren't monolithic there is a continuum. There are Christians who will vote on economic issues if given the chance. They are now faced with a choice between Tweedle Dee and Teedle Dum, the Republican Right and the Republican Lite. Given only that choice they vote for the party who pays lip service to their religion.

The answer is to unite the voters not into Christians and non-Christians but into lower and upper economic classes. The lower classes are the majority. The answer is to take control of the platforms of both parties now and force them to run on issues important to the people. We can make "government of the people, by the people, and for the people" a reality.

This can only be done now before the election before the platforms are set as "for family values" and "against family values". We must force them to run as pro-lower classes or anti-lower classes. Fortunately before the election is the time when our votes have power. Once a vote is cast it has no power.

Join The Lincoln Initiative get both parties to run on the majority's issues. Click on Join Us Today

The notion that religion is taking over government is pure nonsense. It's the opposite.

Or that religion is taking over the society. That notion is also opposite to reality.

Instead, we have religion losing any and all effect on society. We have homosexuals prancing down Main Streat, USA, in codppieces, cavorting in public at Disneyland. We have government intruding itself into the churches, buying them off in George Bush's "faith based initiatives."

George Bush is no Christian, born again or otherwise. Rather, he is a Luciferian Illumininist working for the New World Order. The goal of the New World Order is to destroy Christianity and replace it with the worship of Antichrist.

Along the way, the diabolical plan is to TAKE OVER religion, to bribe and corrupt it, pay Christians money to leave their Bibles and the gospel home, and to become, in effect, government social workers and agents.

As John Lennon said, Imagine a world with no countries, no possessions, no religion, with everybody living for today.

The so-called Relgious Right has tried to jockey for power within the political system. It has been a complete failure. The religous left will instead create a system of institutionalized child sacrifice, orgiastic rituals, elimination of marriage and enforced vegetarianism, and death to all Christians and Jews. Big Brother will never be so pervasive as when the haters of God succeed in erecting their Brave New World.

Since 1973 a 1.5 million babies have been slaughtered each year in America. This is something that was thrust on America by the Supremes. Sure, it looks like the day may be coming (but I'd be shocked if it does) that the Supreme Court may reverse Roe v. Wade. This is known in the game of chess as "sacrificing a pawn" in order to capture the queen and checkmate the king. The purpose of bringing such an event to pass is to fan the flames of hatred against Christians.

George Bush has one job to accomplish. He was hand-picked by the Luciferian Illuminists to bring in the New World Order, destroy America, and to stir up hatred against Christians and Christianity. The goal is to reduce world population to a mere 500 million. See the Georgia Guidestones.

All Christians will be purged in the formation of the NWO utopia. We will be blamed for the mayhem and destruction wrought by George Bush in the name of Christianity. The Bible calls this the Great Tribulation.

Even the peaceful Amish, who have retreated completely from society, don't even vote, never write a letter to the editor or even read the newspapers, who just mind their own business and raise their families -- even they will be sent to the camps our so-called Christian president has building and equipping, for sorting and annihilation.

These days can be equated to the days before the Nazi takeover in Germany. GWB's administration and military is made up of homosexual sadists. Kay Griggs says nobody gets promoted nowadays in the military unless they are willing to participate in homosexual Nazi orgies. The occultic Black Military in their underground cities practices Nazi mind control techniques involving torture and use of children, diabolical breeding experiments.

Jesus said his kingdom was not of this world. The ruler of this world is Satan and his minions. Jesus came to save us from our sins, to provide the way that we might be forgiven and delivered from sin, to find our way to, and remain upon, the narrow path that leads to life everlasting.

For as the Jesus says: What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

Aside from Iraq and Bush, the evangelist element is spoiling the image of America in the eyes of the rest of the world. Of course, at the moment Iraq, Bush and evangelism forms an 'unholy trinity' (ha ha!) in America - they are all co-ordinated and feed off of each other.

For me (I'm British), this is a crying shame as I love America. I guess the way I see it is there is the Republican god-fearing side to America and then there is the more moderate and liberal Democrat side. The rest of the world loves the liberal side to America but has no time whatsoever for the god-stuff. But then, I am a European 'heathen'!

well what on earth do people expect when you gut the education system so that private religious schools dominate educating our young people. I was severely disillusioned the other day to see a poll of Harvard graduates who didn't understand the basic principles of photosynthesis. terrifying.

Isn't t there supposed to be a false Christ in power first - before the ACTUAL Christ returns?

CAN ANYONE NAME THE OTHER FALSE CHRIST BEFORE THIS ONE?

Me neither.

It has always been my belief (and many will call this naive) that the noise being made by religious fundamentalists of all stripes is but the braying of a great beast on the precipice of extinction. The rule of life is change or die. Religionists, ignore this at your peril. I’m sure no dinosaur ever thrashed about so violently and made so much noise as when it was sinking into the tar pit. Gods and religion are anachronisms and they are damned to irrelevance. Already they have no practical value in the world. They answer no questions, solve no problems, create nothing, are paracitical, accomplish no good deeds that cannot be accomplished just as well without them. Religion is a lie and gods are a fraud. Mankind is like a precocious child: capable of great things even while so young, but still afraid of monsters in the closet, but this will change with growth.

for a change?

United we stand AGAINST TYRANNY, divided we fall FOR TYRANNY !

"Whenever I talk about the growing power of the evangelical right with friends, they always ask the same question: What can we do? Usually I reply with a joke: Keep a bag packed and your passport current."

Could your first reaction -- your "joke" -- have been the best one? I have seen far more tolerance among European Christians than these so-called "Evangelists" who preach hate and try to justify oppression, repression murder and robbery.
Those that consider themselves followers of Christ might take a look at Revelations 18: 4 & 5: And I heard another voice from heaven, saying , Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.

While you´re at it, you might read the whole of chapter 18.
Not that it has anything to do with America, you know. Just something to do if you have a few minutes to kill.

And for those that aren´t Christians, well, you´ve all got a God and/or conscience to tell you or advise you what to do. And George Bush has Jiminy Cricket -- er, sorry Karl Rove. I think Jiminy Cricket was sent to the electric chair last month.

If the media would WAKE UP and quit give voice to the fundamentalists and allow the voices of progressive Christians in print you all wouldn't be so afraid!


EXCERPTED April 16 WAWA blog:
The Book of Revelation was written in a time of occupation. It was written twenty years after the empire of Rome had reconquered Palestine and had crushed a Jewish resistance movement.

The Book of Revelation is political and spiritual. John, exiled on Patmos [or perhaps he is a refugee?] confronts the unjust empire of the first century by exposing or unveiling -which is what apocalyptic literature does- the injustice he sees all around him.

The Book of Revelation was never meant to be understood literally; even Christian Zionists understand this fact now and then. In John’s revelation Christ is pictured as a lamb; the absolute contrast to the lion.

It is the nonviolent lamb that points us the way that Christ taught: that the way to peace can only be through nonviolence.

The Book of Revelation was written as a critique of empire and that is how we should read it today.

2,000 years ago zealots stood up to the empire and were crucified.

Today, the empire: USA and Israel
prefers to ignore zealots.
To paraphrase TP:
"You can stand us up at the gates of hell, and we won't back down."

There are voices rising out of the wilderness on the www

Google "WAWA blog"
and you will find us

You say your ideas are not about reconciliation and healing, but it is possible to come from such a place. I have just returned from a conference of the Network of Spiritual Progressives in Washington, an organization that grew from the ideas of Rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of Tikkun (to heal the world) Magazine. Twelve hundred progressive Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Unitarian Universalists and Wiccans, Buddhists, Hindus and Muslims, as well as people who define themselves as Spiritual but not Religious and atheists met for four days to discuss how we might work together. Among the premises of this group are that there IS a spiritual crisis in the US caused by our lust for money and power that the Left has failed to address, that the Right has wrongly married the spiritual hunger of the poor and middle class to the economic interests of the rich, and that the God it worships is one based on fear, retribution and military dominance.

The answer to the Christian Right is to counter it with love compassion, and true social justice, not some chilly secular materialism.

”The mass movement I've described aims to supplant Enlightenment rationalism with what it calls the "Christian worldview."

Perhaps they call it the Christian worldview because it is the viewpoint to which they intend to compel the world to hold (or to give lip service to).

Besides, they couldn’t very well sell it using language such as benighted (or bedimmed) irrationalism. That of course is what it is inasmuch as it would like to take us back to the time before the scientific method was established, before the contributions of men like Bacon, Galileo, Kepler and Newton who together showed the power of observation, hypothesis, experimentation and mathematics could combine to reveal many of the secrets of the physical world.

This, of course was a direct challenge to the authority of the church that had claimed all along to have access (God’s ear so to speak) and inside information about how the universe works. Apparently, God either hadn’t discovered the value of science for Himself yet, or didn’t see fit the share its benefits with us. This is rather inconsiderate considering that we are not omnipotent and don’t have magic at our disposal like he does, so we could certainly have used –say antibiotics- a few centuries before the twentieth.

Christianity teaches three pernicious “facts” that have profound implications for our ability to survive our transition from the age of religion through the ages of technological discovery and implementation and into the spiritual age:

1. The earth and the entire physical universe are unimportant. They are a stage through which we pass for the blink of an eye compared to the eternity that follows. They are disposable. The universe is made of an inferior substance, matter, the inferior form that God had to assume to pay your way into the vastly superior world of immateriality: heaven. They will all be destroyed very soon in war and fire, so there is nothing there that can be protected or that needs protecting.

2. All life below human is soulless and is the property of man to exploit as he sees fit without concern for suffering.

3. Man has no good ideas and can contribute nothing of value to the fund of human knowledge all of which comes only from scripture. All valuable knowledge is in the Bible and is timeless. All other thinking is vanity. Government that is not authoritarian and God-centered is invalid. Man has no right, just gifts from God. Humanity is worthless and, like all other flesh and matter, is unfit to be in the presence of God.

There you have it: all of space and its material contents including earth; all of the biosphere including humanity; and the all thought not derived from the Bible are all worthless, offensive garbage. Vanity of vanities. All of man’s libraries can safely (even profitably) be burned and all ideas less than 2000 years old discarded.

Christianity is incompatible with freedom, democracy, science and human and civil rights. It will always seek to stifle and eliminate to the extent that the law permits them too. A Christian theocracy is a totalitarian state without a constitution or written laws (apart from the Bible) in which citizens have no inherent value and are born owed nothing.

The Purpose Driven Life Takers: an incredibly evil video game of the right wing end of time believers and pushed by the leadership of mega-churches that are more accurately called Christians against Jesus can be seen at www.talk2action.org/story/2006/5/29/195855/959 . The lives of two of four of my fellow siblings has be completely destroyed by the teachings of these churches, requiring psychiatric hospitalization and medication for as many as 21 years and counting.

To get a clear understanding of what these people believe, it is important to get educated. Theocracywatch.org is a must read. The most recent actions of these end of times hypocrites can be found in the "new links" section under "What's New" at http://www.theocracywatch.org/new_links.htm
The dogma of these "churches" is dead in faith and is killing our country through decision by theology rather than sound science. Our schools are dumbing down at a fantastic rate and many of our Universities are no better that an extended high school.

Throughout history, these people have crippled any advancements to make the world a better place in almost, if not every single area of a person's life. These people have declared war on an unwitting public. If not put in check, this country will fall from the corruption they have spread in the halls of leadership, to the trashing of the entire educational system from kindergarten through college.

Our father, which art in Heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our tresspasses as we forgive those who tresspass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Amen.

Pray for this country.
Pray for peace.

Tom Degan
Goshen, NY
tomdegan@frontiernet.net

A story with links of the new religious fascism, and I do mean it in every way, can be seen as well as read about at
www.dailykos.com/
storyonly/2006/5/22/144636/455
This is may be a liberal blog, but it is an article that everyone that has an interest in keeping our nation should read.
Christian Battle Cry is a creation of Ron Luce, a criminal in every way that is brainwashing kids. The numbers of kids is in the hundreds of thousand and their activities has to be seen to be believed. It has the full blessing of many often cited religious leaders, congressmen, senators and of course, our president. Taking a part of the description of the event at Philadelphia, (just one of many sites), Dave Niewart states:

BattleCry Philadelphia was more than just a vulgar carnival designed to suck donations into the coffers of Ron Luce's corporation "Teen Mania". Indeed, it had a point, to recruit the future elite "warriors" in the coming battle against the separation of church and state. It turned dark and frightening on Saturday afternoon. After Franklin "Islam is a Wicked Religion" Graham came out to thunder against the evils of homosexuality and the Iraqi people (whom he considers to be exactly the same people as the ancient Babylonians who enslaved the tribes of Israel and deserving, one would assume, the exact same fate) we heard an explosion. Flames shot out on stage and a team of Navy Seals was shown on the big TV monitors in full camouflage creeping forward down the hallway from the locker room with their M16s. They were hunting us, the future Christian leaders of America. Two teenage girls next to me burst into tears and even I, a jaded middle-aged male, almost jumped out of my skin. I imagined for that moment what it must have felt like to have been a teacher at Columbine high school. 10 seconds later they rushed out onstage and pointed their guns in our direction firing blanks spitting flames. About 1000 shots and bang, we were all dead.

This should not be happening here. Yet it is with the blessing of our nation's leaders!

That is a fact. The evangelicals would not be spreading their world view if they didn't believe this to be so. There is only one God, the Trinity which are in the book of life. All non-believers will be cast into eternal hellfire and damnation, PERIOD. That is central to their belief. There are no progressive evangelicals as it is against their central belief (What evangelism means and how it is practiced).

All this conjecture is wonderful. Here is another idea.

The Christian Right is convinced that the 'Rapture' will take them all away, leaving us sinners here to suffer. My take on that is that the obnoxious religious among us will be raptured out and we can have their stuff- 0r- they will just keep waiting and pretty soon they will all look silly . As a matter of fact, they look silly now. I have been asking my local 'Christians' if I can have their stuff when they rapture. How about having a good laugh at them while remembering the laws of karma. If one claims to believe in the teachings of Christ, those teachings become the driver of the life. When that life is out of harmony with the teachings, things happen to bring this fact to the attention of the individual. Example - the wonderful Christian family with perfect lives and perfect children has one son who goes out and gets drunk and kills someone. OOPS! Happens all the time if you just pay attention. There sit those 'upright citizens' with egg on their faces. That stiff, cold,arrogant 'Christian' attitude just isn't going to work. It isn't what Christ is about. What goes around really does come around.

It is possible to say No to these people. If enough of us would stand in behalf of the gays, women, children and general domestic balance, perhaps we could change things. The Christ I know would be happy to give some energy to kindness. It certainly does no good to sit in fear and try to figure out what 'The Christians' will do next.

I lived in the 50s with the cold war, McCarthy hearings, back room abortions, racism, child abuse,subservient women. You know what happened when things got too bad?------ the 60s where it all blew up because the people had enough of stiff, mean spirited, patriarchal thinking. It was time to bust the game, and although it appeared chaos, it needed to happen all at once. A lot of good things came from that revolution- some not so good. And so it is........

Times are looking similar and worse. Time for change? You bet! The question is ----- are Americans willing to get up off our collective fat butts and stand for what we believe or are we going to let the ' religious right' dictate our lives?

Some really bad places
http://www.raptureready.com/
http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/
http://theendtimesproject.com/
http://secure.agoramedia.com/
leftbehind/index_leftbehind26.asp?promo=3BE088F9-
D909-418E-A21A-068B7607CB07&email=&pu=0
http://www.victorious.net/prophecy/index.shtml
http://www.antipasministries.com/
http://www.leftbehind.com/
http://www.chritech.com/iseek/pages/
Theology_and_Apologetics/Eschatology/
http://www.campus-watch.org/
http://www.promisekeepers.org/
http://www.hallindseyoracle.com/
http://www.jvim.com/
http://www.terrylcook.com/
http://www.bible-prophecy.com/links.htm
http://www.coralridge.org/
http://www.reclaimamerica.org/
http://www.alliancedefensefund.org/main/default.aspx
http://www.cc.org/
http://www.nae.net/
http://www.seekgod.ca/cff.htm
http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb06?
_RELIGIOUS_ROUNDTABLE_
http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb01?
RELIGIOUS_ROUNDTABLE_
http://www.sweetliberty.org/index.shtml
http://www.afa.net/
http://www.agapepress.org/
http://www.cufi.org/

I am tired of pastors/preachers/evangelists who want to play in politics rather than do their real job: teaching the Bible to those who choose to attend. Playing political pundit is not part of the job description. I sincerely believe that many of those 'called' to the pastoral ministry were not called by God but by their wallet and thirst for power.

The Bible teaches that the followers of Jesus should live quiet & peaceful lives with their personal conduct being the primary witness of their faith. They are to obey and abide by civil law and respect authority. Directed to be forgiving and charitable, they are charged with looking out after the people at the margins of existence-- the last with the least. Does this sound like the clowns masquerading as pastors in many churches today?

Jesus taught his followers that people would come into the church without faith-- seeking to co-opt it for their own purposes. He likened then to ravenous wolves that masqueraded as sheep. They are widespread and powerful in many denominations today.

I am a Christ-follower and I want the church out of politics and politics out of the church. I do not want organized prayer in schools or fake science taught in the classroom. I would like to see others who claim to be christians more interested in helping those in need and less about politics and wealth accumulation.

One of the cornerstones of Christian Theology is the concept of people being free moral agents-- otherwise you have an inherent right/responsibility to determine your own views and faith. 'Christians' who advocate advancing their viewpoint into law are actually going against foundational Christian Doctrine. If these so-called leaders and teachers are unaware of this fact , they are not qualified to teach. If they know it and ignore it they are also disqualified.

The sheeple in the pews have been hand-fed for so long that they cannot tell the difference. Please do not confuse honest Christ-followers with the freaks abusing the church for their personal benefit.

my father is quite conservative, a total ditto head, but a closet intellectual (or at least he used to be). my step-mother is a devout catholic, who teaches a catchetism class. Im the long-haired lefty liberal son, living abroad. when I go home we play a game where I argue against my dads conservative platform by asking my stepmom to counter only using jesus' quotes from the bible. my dads pretty good, but Im afraid the laughter of my stepmother, who also supports bush (funny that) and my 16year old sister, always make his arguements sound ridiculous, like when bush is talking about stem-cell research, I'll paraphrase, he says you cannot sacrifice innocent life to save others, and he sort of catches himself mid-sentence, thats when bush's mind clicks, and he realizes the complete hypocracy of his words, and he almost loses it for a second, and hopes nobody in the room will call him on it.

History tells us that aggressive religious movements tend to become strong political movements. How to separate the "beliefs" form the politics is the problem. What seems idealistically irrational may be politically quite pragmatic. The Xtian Right has gained more political clout for a whole bunch of little white people than they had until recently.

He has said this on his appearance on The Daily Show. There was only hope for Jon Stuart if he converted!

the originators of the constitution were aware of the religious power to over throw any opposition to the belief of said religion. So listening to moyers interview other.... asked what is religion? answer....connecting the body with spirit. possibly a bit revised. the common good of all ah is to have all teaching of religion a say. To play with the earth requires the ability to see, hear, feel, the better good for all. aloha carlin et al.

I'm a Baptist, and a pretty darn conservative one. I oppose abortion, euthanasia and medical experiments on embryos. While I oppose gay marriage on religious grounds, my political opposition to it is actually rooted in my view that the very concept of "gay marriage" is a contradiction in terms, like "dry water." I supported the decision to invade Iraq, and still do.

And yet, I just don't feel especially rabid. I can't say I hate you guys. Frankly you strike me as more silly than anything else, but probably nice enough folk. I've no interest in outlawing your opinions, or hauling you off to some gulag somewhere. I'm perfectly content to live in the same country as people who think the way you do. I kind of enjoy it, in fact.

But I keep reading the nutzo ravings about the Evangelical Menace and I find myself wondering--what on earth are you people smoking? You take odds and ends of evangelical pop culture--which is, if anything, stupider than pop culture in general--and whip it into some grand conspiracy of evil.

Look, here's an idea. Calm down. Do yourselves a favor. Subscribe to a few serious magazines, like Christianity Today, or First Things. Hang out at good Christian websites like markdroberts.com or albertmohler.com. Get a feel for the best in evangelical thought. You might find that most "jellies" are a reasonably sane bunch, with more than a few deep thinkers amongst them. Sure, it's not as much fun as fretting over the Rise of the Wackos, but it's a lot closer to reality than anything I've seen in this bizarro thread. And it'd let you guys get more sleep at night, knowing that we are not, in fact, Coming For You.

Never mind reading Michelle Goldberg. Here's everything you need to know to understand Christianity in America! If only Michelle had had access to this splendid piece of scholarship! But it's not too late--she can still revise the paperback edition!

This article has some excellent points about some of the challenges facing Americans today, and clearly merits debate about the proposed causes, and solutions to, these challenges. Two quotes cut to the point:

"The anxieties that underlay Christian nationalism's appeal -- fears about social breakdown, marital instability and cultural decline -- are real."

So how about a movement that can address these "root causes" and present a clear, rational solution? I don't pretend to know what the solution is but I have a feeling it may have something to do with a cultural shift from values based on individualistic, instant-gratifying consumerists into a culture that instead values increased contribution to his or her community and decreased impact/footprint on the planet. But the capitalist component of the equation probably won't let that happen.

"The challenge, finally, is to make reality matter again. If progressives can do that, perhaps America can be saved."

Doesn't that just sum it up. So many people with the "correct values" (the Christianists, among others) have figured out how to spin the information so that reality becomes blurred. And so many people, either without an alternative source of information or stuck in a dogmatic belief system, believe it to be true. Here the root cause is usually clear: money. Again I don't know the solution, but certainly political and media reform are necessary: public campaign financing, earmark reform, government accountability and openness, and do something about our infotainment "news".

Our values are so screwed up it's no wonder there is increased push for the Christian Nationalist government. But as the author so ably points out, their goal would be a travesty to freedom and democracy for the entire world. There has to be a better option.

you may be a nice, sane person. but when you oppose my access to contraception or abortion, or refuse to let my gay friends and family have the legal protections of marriage, or inject your religious beliefs into the public school system, then yes, you *are* "coming for me." You are a threat to me and my loved ones.

As soon as you vote or take any other political action to impose your religious views on me, you are attacking me.

If the overclass in its GOP or Democrats guise can scare you into voting for them by using some sham, worthless. piece of crap non-issue, such as demonizing some group or person, then the overclass never has to promise to do anything substantial about the real issues that matter like universal healthcare, progressive taxation, and mass immigration.

Notice that all these electoral political puppets that call themselves "political activists" of the Democratic and GOP persuasion just fall all over themselves to pump up whatever scare tactic their particular overclass is selling to them.

Do not fall into the trap of political activism directed towards electoral politics.

This article adds to a message which has been getting out more and more lately. That being that progressives need to pay more attention to the religious need that drives their fellow citizens.

People don't realize how alienating their worldviews are to the other side. Athiests can be very alienating. Christians can be positively scary. This article painted a frightening picture of the Christian fundamentalist movement gaining momentum in America.

The article mentioned that economic crisis may arrive here in the United States soon. Many are much more certain that it will. I'm certain that the United States is falling from its privileged position, and will soon be forced to take a place as simply a peer among many nations. It's frightening to think of the suffering that any sort of fundamentalism might incur, should it seize power while this transition occurs.

I encourage all, both Christian and non-Christian, to listen to this introduction to Ernest Becker. If you have a low-bandwidth connection, here is a transcript of a lecture which introduces many of Ernest Becker's theories, in a particularly Christian context.

We each are capable of real, honest-to-goodness compassion and understanding. However, we have some very difficult challenges to overcome in order to achieve this, not the least of which is a culture which seems to have a hunger for a life of its own, regardless of the harm it does to our relatively weak individual human lives. Ernest Becker illuminates the weaknesses within each of us which drives us to create such overwhelmingly powerful cultures, which leads to such hate and division.

Christians need to learn to respect the rationality of athiests, and not fear their godless hearts. Athiests need to learn the underlying truth at the heart of Christianity, and show some respect for that which drives Christians towards faith. I think that what Becker has to say can help both sides.

Here's my challenge: Give Becker's ideas a listen, then tell me that you agree or not.

"This is a very dangerous trend. My bag isn't packed yet, but I would suggest keeping a close eye on Supreme Court decisions and be prepared."

I'm not going anywhere. This is OUR piece of dirt, not the invisible cloud being's. I don't HAVE to follow any of the 10 commandments, if you follow my drift (hey - the christians don't). They want a war? Great. They'll be less people to take up space on the earth, and a lot less christians to tell me I'm going to hell if I don't believe or get born again.

god was created by people, religion was created by people, and the earth will be destroyed by people.

Why did we stop feeding them to the lions?

The religious Right, in particular, has made a devil's bargain by aligning itself with the Republican right-wing. The fact is: despite all their braying and noise, they have no real answers to the problems of society i.e. environmental issues, economic decline, etc. People will come to see it and realize that these people do not have the answers to their problems in life.

Recently, I had a talk with a person who had been a history teacher in the former Soviet Union. I asked him how Russia could have become an officially atheistic society after the Revolution. He told me something VERY revealing. At the time of the Revolution and after, many many Russians had no faith in their traditional religion, and weren't too concerned about seeing it go--even the common people. And the reason he gave was that the Russian churches had allied themselves with the Czarist government, and many people viewed them as merely another tool of their opression.

I agree with some of the other comments on this website. The noise of the religious right is nothing more than the last gasp of a world-view that has no answers, never had the answers, and in the face of science and rational critique falls apart like a rotten house.

The religious divide in this country is only going to get worse. The reason is that there are truly awful things happening in the world and people want to feel secure. So they need to turn to something to help them cope. Most turn to religion. Others turn to science. Both groups think they are right. The fact of the matter is that neither are right because they don't understand the true nature of this planet. We (humans) are existing in a blink of an eye to the universe. We have no hope of surviving. There literally is 0% chance that the human race is going to survive for more than an instant in the time span of the universe. Society is doomed to break down eventually. The only part that is uncertain is when it's going to happen. If it happens now with global climate change, or some sort of secular vs. religious war, or a massive oil shortage, then so be it. The problems are not going to get better and certainly won't go away. There are solutions of course. If everyone on the planet decided to stop worshipping any god, to stop driving cars, and to stop caring about money, then I think we could get back to a peaceful, healty existence. Good luck getting that to happen though.

Christianity is not what the contemporary teachings would imply. Christianity is a pagan solar religion, based upon solar and astrological allegories and personifications. It is the continuation of a story based upon the zodiac. Jesus survived the crucifixion, he was re-born three days later. Step outside first thing in the morning and look to the east. You'll see him rising, again. Jesus is a personification of the sUn. The cross is an ancient symbol of the division of the four seasons. The sun is often depicted in the center. The sun "dies" every day, annually, and at the beginning of each Age. Jesus is another solar deity. He was born three days after the sun figuratively died on the winter solstice. Jesus is the light of the world. Jesus is the bright morning star. Jesus existed during the Age of Pisces. Jesus' sign is the fish. The sign of Pisces is the fish. Abraham existed during the Age of Aries. Abraham's sign is the ram. The sign of Aries is the ram. Alternatively, Mithra slays a bull (Taurus), ushering in the Age of Aries. Why would I mention Mithra? I'm glad that I asked that question...An inscription in the Vatican states plainly, "He who will not eat of my body, nor drink of my blood, so that he may be one with me and I with him, shall not be saved." This is not terribly surprising, unless you consider that this is inscribed on the remains of the temple the Vatican was built on-one dedicated to the God Mithra. Mithra was a solar deity whose worshipers called him redeemer; his religion died out not long after the advent of Christianity. You see, the story of Jesus was concocted as the solar deity in the Age of Pisces. The story of Jesus is a continuation of a story based on the zodiac...twelve tribes of Israel, twelve disciples, twelve signs of the zodiac. Jesus was "baptized" at the "age" of thirty (360 degrees in a circle divided by the 12 signs of the zodiac equals 30 degrees of each sign). It is all based upon solar and astrological allegories and personifications. Each of the 12 Zodiac constellations takes its turn ruling what's called an "astrological age." "And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age." Matthew 28:20. This is in reference to the end of the Age of Pisces. In Luke 22:10, when Jesus is asked by his 12 apostles where he will go to settle his new kingdom, he responds, "Behold, when ye arew entered into the city, there shall a man meet you bearing a pitcher of water, follow him into the house where he entereth in." This is the "House of Aquarius" (the next Age). In the Book of Revelation,there is mention of the twelve stones that are the foundation of the wall in the New Jerusalem. Revelation 21:19-20 "The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third chalcedony, the fourth emerald, the fifth sardonyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst." These are the ancient stones that were, respectively, assigned to the individual signs of the zodiac. In regard to the da Vinci code, I really don't see how Jesus could have fathered a child, being a personification of the sUn. I realize that we still don't know everything that there is to know about stars, but for a mass of hydrogen and helium to conceive a flesh and blood child seems like a bit of a stretch to me. It is a sham. I suppose that is not entirely accurate. There is a concealed lineage of Jesus (Pisces), but it is not flesh and blood. It is Aquarius, the next Age. Astrology is all over the Bible. But, they tell us that it is of the devil. It is interesting that Saturn appears to be the foundation of Saturday and Satan. This nation is more Christian than ever. How many people of all walks of life consult their horoscopes?

Gays, and this are just a distraction. The truth about our gov't and the real reasons we're at war and make the decisions we do can be found. Do some research, from 9/11, OKC, CIA, Bush family, Mossaad, MI 6 the world banks, China, Walmart etc.

"This time the bullet cold rocked ya.
A yellow ribbon instead of a swatstika.
Nothin proper about your propaganda.
Fools follow rules when the set comands ya.
They said it was blue when the blood was read
That's how you got a bullet blasted through your head." RATM

The issue is leadership. Fundamentalism is another word for KISS—keep it simple stupid. One sees lots of other attempts at simple solutions on this BBS, blaming the Illuminati, money, or some other race or politics for all our difficulties.

A rational approach to ‘enlightenment’ offers no simple solution, so its leadership is always diffuse. Rationality is messy, and depending on what version of it you believe in, full of as many fallacies as fundamentalism.

Our last theocracy, and it was limited to certain privileges and tax benefits for an established church, was in Massachusetts ending sometime before 1825. Liberals, at that time, pulled off a coup and took the churches away from the fundies. Whether it was a guilty conscience or proof of the rule of law, those privileges had to be given up under the rule of the First Amendment.

My argument with the original article here is the confusion of a need for protection of the Constitution and suggestions for changes to the Constitution. It needs to be protected from both left and right at the moment. Keep your hands off it. Our problem is laziness not law.

The old song tells us, “They say that freedom is a constant struggle.” You better believe it.

No better argument than labeling someone crazy. As for Walmart, I was hinting at the Chinese gov't and the Clintons. It really isn't hard to find. But don't. I'm nuts because you say so and therefore my comment should be removed immediately. Thank You, Jesme, I am currently calling a local mental institute.

The reason that the Xtian Right is so up in arms is a very simple fact that most people overlook. Talking donkeys don't exist. The Bible says they do but I seriously doubt anyone over the age of five believes it.

Although 80% of the US profess to be Christians, there is another segment of the theological landscape that is growing by leaps and bounds. According to the US Census Bureau, the next largest religeous group is "agnostic, atheists or no religion" This demographic has DOUBLED in the last ten years. It is likely to double in the next decade too.

So you wingnuts better get your hog noses to the government trough pretty quick before it all dries up. I put in a faith-based grant proposal to the National Academy of Science last week seeking funds for my unicorn breeding program. I hope its approved before some less righteous people (Lutherans, Presbyterians/Catholic) are elected.

Bottom line is the world IS one way and the Bible SAYS its another way. Reality will win eventually.

There are two sets of instructions from above: God's Commandments and then God's Laws. The commandments are actually just guidelines since everyone breaks one now and then (bear false witness, envy the neighbors property). On the other hand, God's Laws cannot be broken regardless of the strengh of your faith. Just try breaking the law of gravity or exceeding the speed of light. So, in my view, the laws of God preempt any commandments. Next time an Xtian gets in your face ask them why God made the universe with certain inviolate laws that their theology is at direct odds with.

And when you need a well-bred unicorn, you can order one up (in a variety of colors) at gregforestmedia.com.

Yours Faithfully In The Law,

-Greg Forest

I, for one, will not "cut and run" or appease the terrorists by turning this country into a sans-rights theocracy. Any advances by the Christian right sends a message to the terrorists: Keep doing what you're doing.

funny thing is, this is all happening, right in front of everyones eyes.

and no one cares, because about 80% of america are christians. Radical christians will say that they should be able to do this, because they are the majority, that they have the right to ban abortion, or bann contraceptives, or hell even preach religion in schools.

but the truth is, this country was NOT founded on the majoritys rights, but rather on the minoritys. and it sickens me that radical groups like this one, are trying to twist our political system to fit what they want.

im 14, and I am an atheist, and I cant even count the times ive been told im going to hell because of it.

not to mention, that religion IS CURRENTLY preached in schools, though not openly, for example:

my english teacher was reading Lord Of The Flys, in my class. and there was a SMALL, talking about the garden of eden.

so my teacher took 45 minutes explaining christianity, and practically preaching it to my class.

the seperation of church and state is almost non existent now.

A very fine piece of writing, like having ice water thrust in my face. It got my attention.

The Senate was constructed to protect minority representation as a counterweight to the House, where the number of representatives per state is based on population density. Consequently, NY has far more members than Wyoming, and so on. To suggest that the Senate composition should be altered is to miss the point on the essential failures of national representative government in our "congressional" system.

The confirmation of General Hayden to run the CIA was abetted by 4 "Democratic" Senators on the Intelligence Committee. Had they voted no with their colleagues on the committee, it's likely the full Senate would not so easily have confirmed Hayden, and may even have rejected his nomination. This had little to do with population issues, and much more to do with politics and secret deal-making.

In the House, gerrymandering by entrenched Republicans, led by Tom Delay in Texas, but also accomplsihed in other states, has distorted the quality and quantity of representation by Democrats, even in populous regions of the country. This phenomenon has been aggravated by the Megachurch culture Ms. Goldberg refers to in her excerpt, and more broadly by the great migration of southern Democrats to the GOP over the past 25 years, reflective of the near extinction of the private-sector union movement as a political force in this country, and the alignment of much stronger public-sector unions with corporate interests around the nation (read GOP) when it appears to further their own interests.

Without the union monolith behind it, the Democratic Party has had to seek out the same corporate money from the same players that the GOP traditionally relies on. Notwithstanding the Internet-based money machine introduced by Howard Dean in 2003-04, which may prove to be a sustained revenue stream for the progressive movement, the centrist Dems are forced to feed at the same trough as the Republicans, and hence to move further and further away from the liberal principles that made them "New Deal" , "Great Society" Democrats in the first place. "If it waddles like a duck, preens like a duck, quacks like a duck......it's a duck". So we get "Republican Lite".

To my mind, media and communication in general are at the heart of this threat from Christian nationalism. Levers need to be pulled that return political discourse to center stage on TV and radio. Some form of return to the "Equal Time" rule needs to be developed and implemented, taking into consideration the rise of independent voters outside the traditional 2-party system. There must be an opportunity for more frequent AUTHENTIC debate and discussion on mainstream TV of alternative views, not just the establishment, inside-the-beltway drones that get asked back to Meet the Press again and again.

Authenticity must be emphasized. People are hungering for more authentic, unscripted, de-controlled political exchange of the type sometimes seen on C-Span, especially among actual candidates for office. The technology of the Internet has made our national political world much smaller, and TV and radio must begin to recognize that reality along with the Blogosphere.

Should this happen, more light may be shed on all these issues. Now, we have a commercialized news paradigm in which heat, not light, is the objective in most broadcasts, with MTV-style production values (noise, flash, quick-cuts, swish pans, scatter zooms, and other attention-diminishing techniques having become SOP) taking the place of substantive, authentic, minimally orchestrated exchange. Exceptions like "Frontline", "NOW", "60 Minutes" "Democracy Now" on WBAI, "Countdown" (the first 30 minutes) or HBO specials prove the rule that little hard journalism exists anymore on commerical TV or radio.....(continued)

Without a more egalitarian media paradigm coming back into the public square, and effectively drawing to it the great mass of young voters who are either repulsed or apathetic, or both, to the craven political process that has been allowed to swallow our so-called democracy whole, no amount of policy clarification, position development or fund-raising success is going to amount to more than the occasional illusory issue-centric "triumph" over the forces of theocratic darkness (every time the NRDC knocked back the ANWAR drilling lobby and sent out a congratulatory email, a few months later they came back for more money to stop the next legislative assault....it never ends).

As Glenn Greenwald wrote in these pages, the blogosphere seems to have visceral power around an issue, but in the end, the attention span-deficit kicks in, another "crisis du jour" looms, the blogosphere jumps off the old onto the new band wagon, the bloviating to the choir reaches critical mass, the Washington Insiders Game plays out "same old same old", and all the passionate blogging appears to have the eventual influence of a fly buzzing your nose. Swat!

Until authentic political discourse, exchange, expose and analysis by diverse sources can have even a fraction of the prevalence of sports programming and car and beer commercials, we're doomed to the ever-widening gulf between rationalists and (Christian) nationalists. We're all Americans, but we might as well be from Mars and Venus. TV and radio got us here and have become central to the problem...they can be part of the solution, but only if we have the will to make it so.

Apparently you all are. Seems that this group of mostly very good people that have a worldview based on Christianity are perceived as a greater threat than the Commie peril. In reality Christians have been subjected to the worst bigotry by the same kinds of people that populate these left wing forums. All I ever hear most Christians say is that they don't like the filthy puke of Secularism and the deviancy of Hollywood culture and the public mis-education system intruding into their lives. The vast majority of Christians only want to do good for their neighbors and lead quiet lives with their families. This seems to cause a great deal of hostility from the irreligious left. Things got so bad for people of faith that they decided that they were going to fight back against those forces of the irreligious left. They might be Christians but they ain't sheep who are going to willingly submit to the moral and spiritual decay put forth by those folks who claim to be "enlightened". True Christians know that the heart of man is depraved and that we should seek moral absolutes. Secularists believe that man will find his own way given enough time and knowledge. The Christians are right. The Secularists are not.

HuffPost and Alternet are so full of uninformed fear-mongering. I suspect, but of course can not prove, that the anti-Christian ranters fall into two broad groups.

1. People who have been traumatized by childhood experiences in "Christian" families, emotionally and often physically abused by those who use the Bible as a fig leaf for their sadism. I feel for these folks, but I would point out that I was raised in a secular household and was seriously abused, so it's not only the Bible that people use as a cover for these horrors.

2. People who really know very little about what's happening in the various denominations in the US, but simply react with understandable shock and rage to the antics of a relatively small group of racist, homophobic, sexist fundamentalists.
Things are changing fast in the US churches, and progressives would be wise to pay attention. The organizing and disinformation campaigns by the GOP in churches over the last 30 years have pretty much played out, the pendulum is swinging away from them now.

It is easy to find people who say outrageous and divisive things. Harder to find are people who are willing to speak out for peace and reconciliation. Which we need plenty of. Religion is not going to go away, whatever Sam Harris or others of his ilk have to say about it. And the history of the left in the US and the world is full of heroes who also happened to believe in invisible things. You can't yell people away, you can't hate them away. This is a lesson that both the fundamentalists and the hard-core secularists need to learn.

The future of the US, if there is one, will depend on bridge-building and honest communication in good faith. To the first poster who tells me this is impossible: I've heard that before, in Ireland, and the Middle East, and other places in the world where people kill children to prove a point. Alternet and Huffpost do the left a serious disservice by highlighting and featuring the kind of misinformation and exaggeration contained in this piece.

The squeaky wheel always gets the grease. The schemers at the GOP love it when leftists focus on the religious right. THis is always a loser for the left. Most African Americans, for example, really don't feel welcomed by a movement that tells them that the book which sustained them through generations of horror is a fairy tale that only a fool would take seriously.

One final list to consider: MLK (Methodist), Dorothy Day and the Berrigans (Catholic), William Sloane Coffin (UCC), the sanctuary movement of the 80's (largely Quaker). When the left was strong in the US, religion was a huge part of its success. Do you want to succeed, or just to be right?

As I read through these responses I keep hearing over and over again, that the christian right this article is about is really comprised of freaks. I disagree with that term. According to dictionary.com the term freak means a fleck or speck of color. Hence implying that the slang use of the word refers to an amount of people that's unusual or minimal. However, when I turn on the radio or read the paper I'm confronted with the actions being taken by these so called freaks such as the attempt at passing the Marriage Amendment, the cross at Mt Soledad, the second attempt in California of getting parental consent to an abortion. These are not the makings of freaks, these are the makings of a majority. The freaks are those that care enough to try and stop the spread of intolerance. It has been my experience that religion, regardless of what you call it or how you practice it, is in itself a method of repression. As long as religion exists humanity will not be able to progress socially, economically, or in any way. To have faith in that which is not scientifically driven is to deny logic. As long as the majority denies logic how is it that progress is possible? Anything logically driven is an affront to any religion, since religion is based in faith and faith is not logically bound. That is why, in my opinion, these "freaks" of christianity are so powerful. The majority believes in "God" in some form or another, especially the less educated in society. As long as there are people that use logic and people that use faith there will always be a conflict. The problem is that currently the majority are into faith since the majority of the population is lower-class and need something to believe in to alleviate their plight.

I am not a christian, nor am I an athiest -- I was raised catholic, and am very familiar with both the narratives and philosophies of christianity.

I would argue that the type of evangenical movment that Goldberg documents in her book, and that which innundates popular culture and government at this moment, is not Christianity, but some other religion: one which reinterprets and fetishizes the some of the Christian texts -- one need only examine the movement's selective quoting and it's need for a bizzare Darbian reading of the Bible to get a sense of this.

Nonetheless, this movement is antithetical to a free democratic state. It holds that all of reality -- all that can be known or considered in science, law, philosphy, and economics is already documented in the Bible or through its scholars. This is not unlike the Islamic theocrats in other parts of the world. This group sees itself as the persecuted saviors of our country; they cannot be reasoned with for there is no rationality to their arguments -- it is all based in faith. This group is, presently, in political and cultural ascendentcy, and we should all fear the consequences of this to our free society.

What is wrong with the GOlden Rule ? nothing, it preserves life
What is wrong with the 10 commandments ? nothing, it shows the way to live in a culture.

What is wrong with the way God created the world, nothing.
Only man has messed it up with his own self-righteousness.

ALmost every great Busniess book written is based on the principles in the Bible, "golden rule"
Love your neighbor as you love yourself.

This article makes some interesting points, but suffers from a problem I see in many leftist articles. There seems to be a tendency for writers to mention every progressive issue in every lefty article!

Let's focus on issues ALL or MOST of us on the left may agree on, rather than lump all our issues together every time there's a challenge.

While I favor gay rights, must we scare off millions of people (potential allies against the Christrian Right) who DON'T see this as THE MOST IMPORTANT issue? Is gay marriage really the linchpin of our fight against the C.R.?

When I go to an anti-war protest, why must I deal with the A.N.S.W.E.R people who want to talk about racism and about freeing Mumia? What about if I'm just against the war in Iraq?

Let's focus on the core issues: separation of church and state; and for the religious folks, telling the Christian Right that God doesn't speak only through them.

The golden rule was around before the bible, smarty pants. How ignorant of you.

If things keep going the way they have been, I predict an armed revolution within 20 years. And if the gap between the Christian Right, or Dominionists, and the non-religious continues to grow, the middle continues to shrink, and no common ground can be found, I fear this country is headed toward civil war. Any way one slices it, if current trends continue, I can pretty much guarantee that things are gonna get PRETTY UGLY in this country- quite possibly making Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Bosnia, and Kosovo looking like child's play.

Just like the author, I feel I need to be packed and I do have worries about the growing threat of the religious right.
that's fear.
Because of this, it causes loathing.
I see the Religious Right as the biggest threat today. We are dealing with people who live in an alternate reality. Who will threaten your life for disagreeing. Who walk around with WWJD all over but, behave like fascists and very little like Christians.
Afterall, biogtry. threatening people, forcing people to live thier way and cheating, as in elections, isn't very Christian
The author suggests to get the help of the media but, they are not likely to help while they still have the swoons over Bush.
They aim to destroy the public schools to undermine women but, we still have the private schools. Just don't tell them or they will try to shut those down, too.
I am one of the lucky ones. My mother is from France. I have a dual citizanship and family there. I have options. But, for those who don't, if the religious right keeps taking over everything, I can see Canada going through the same immagration debate this country is now going through. Only it won't be the people from Mexico. It'll be Americans.

Bush and the GOP have used these "good Christians" to help fuel their electoral success as cynically as Nixon and the GOP used white resentment to fuel their success in the South. The GOP has demonstrated time and time again that it cares little for the consequences of their "repressor as victim" rhetoric; it stems from the fact that they know that if people know their real agendas/policies they would always lose. So they sow division in American society to further their political gain.

My prediction: If a Democrat is elected President in 2008, the furor and the false sense of victim hood that the GOP is instilling in Christian Conservatives will lead to a plot to assassinate that President.

Shame on them for sowing such poisonous seeds.

Does anyone else besides me find it ironic that some people are perfectly willing to have the US be an officially Christian nation but deny the rights of other countries to organize under the principles of another religion? (I'm thinking of countries that operate under Sharia law) Or does a religious state have to select the "correct" religion in order to avoid being labeled as a theocracy?

"We have homosexuals prancing down Main Streat, USA, in codppieces, cavorting in public at Disneyland."

C'mon mate, admit it... this sounds rather fetching to you doesnt it? Its o.k to be gay , you dont have to live in denial. Honestly, us free thinking individuals wont think any less of you.

A better term than Christian Nationalism would be Christian Fascism. If they achieve unrestricted power, suppression, jailings, and executions would soon start.

All I have to say is that the United States is going down the crapper. Plain and simple.

My grandfather fought for this country in WWII. Before his death he mentioned to me that gold and silver were to never be replaced with paper. That America was doomed to distruction over greed and lack of the perseverence of worth in a real amount that could be carried throughout life.

My dad fought in Vietnam. To this day, and he is still alive is repulsed at our governement and what we have brought on ourselves. Our family came over on the Mayflower. We would have never believed what we now witness in our past generations.

While separation of church(pig), and the government, schools etc.. is fashioned as such by the government, we lose daily the reality that life is what the messiah came to bring. This country, it's sin, it's blasphemy is exactly what happens when you throw out wisdom and sound judgment that has been proven to be at least 99% accurate.

For all of those that believe that Bush should be impeached. I agree. Better yet, my vote would be that he be sent to the front lines of Iraq to fight for what my family has fought for.

I would also state that you will have difficulty at replacing evil at any level of current US government no matter the political party. If the sripture is accurate, we are right where it's destined to be. A calamity of all proportions.

That is the scripture. That is Yahweh.

Btw. Get a spell checker installed. Unix/Linux has a couple to choose from.

--rjs

whenever jesusfreaks assault me with their nitwittery.

Our Founding Fathers were Unitarians, NOT Christians. One must read Thomas Jefferson to understand the profound abhorance he felt towards organized "Christianity" and "Clergy". I too share that sentiment.

Historicall of course, even their very own bible states these "Jews", Mary and Joseph, were taking their infant to Eygpt.

Why? And why were "Wise Men" (from Iraq and Turkey, the tomb of the Iraqi "Wise Man" exists to this day) following "A Star"?

Because the "Wise Men" were Egyptian mystery school grads. And being followers of the Astronomy based religions (your 12 "disciples" are the 12 months of the horoscope, go look closely), they knew the "Procession" of the stars through a well known ancient religion.

"Jesus", well, I hate to tell ya, but there are NO Roman tax records for any "Joseph and Mary". And there would have been. Romans even taxed your chickens and pigs. "Mary" was not a name given to just anyone, either.

A "Mari" was a Priestess, of the Egyptian Isis religion. They were taking their gifted child back HOME, away from Roman oppression.

And a special, bright and gifted youth in this epoch would be invited to attend one of the mystery schools in Egypt. Begin as a "Crestus", and through learning the "mysteries", become a magician, a priest of Isis. Upon mastering the mysteries, this pupil, this "almost there Crestus" (as in approaching a crest) would then become a "Cristus."

A symbol of the pharoah was his beard. A distinctive beard, like the shape of a "J", it even survived long afterwards in the saying " I swear by my beard" as an oath.

A priest of Isis, with the symbol of the pharoah (recall the pharoah was GOD ON EARTH), would be symbolized by a "J", followed by the cult he represented. Isis.

J Isis.
J esus

Jesus. The Cristus.

BTW, the "Lazarus" that J Isis "raised from the dead" was in fact earlier known as "El Lazar." Interesting coinkidink how El Lazar regained life in that earlier version.
Hint: Anytime you see an "El, or Al, or Bal" in an ancient name, it symbolizes a "God."

Go(ogle) look it up, larn yourselves sumpin.

Like how the "Trinity" is an 11th century invention by St Ignatius.

Hint: Ahkenaton's grandfather was named (Tut)moses. Both Moses and Akhanaton founded a religion based on ONE GOD. The "Atun", The SUN. Later, after being run out of town by p.o.ed followers of the older cults, the older cult leaders had their followers always end their prayers by calling on the OLD GOD, AMUN.

Still do. No? You don't end YOUR prayer "A Men"???

Both Akhenaton and "Moses" led their followers into the desert, holding a staff with a serpent wound around it.

Read your bible, about the "Mountain" Moses enters DOWN "INTO" not climbs.

A "mountain" surrounded (according to bible) by a black stone walkway. That the Medianite "God", Yahwah supposedly lived in. Medianite, as in "Moses' wife's" tribe. That's the first time "Jews" had that name for their "God", BTW. Tweaked it slightly, but there ya are.

That "mountain" was a Pyramid.

YOU are all the "God" you'll ever need: "My Kingdom is not of this earth." J Isis. Take his word for it.

The "King David" fairytale was stolen from a Pharoah called, you guessed it, The STAR Pharoah. His symbol...well, I think you can figure that out by now. His children (recall, this precedes the Hebrew legend by a thousand years or more) had the EXACT SAME NAMES as "David."

Guess when you've been enslaved for centuries, you need to cop someone's identity, yes?

yes.

I know this sounds terribly far-fetched right now, but I wonder if those "secret" prison camps that the federal government is currently constructing out in the middle of the United States are just going to sit there idly, or of they are actually intended to be the future home of secularists and anybody else who dares to speak out against the theocratic tyranny that will soon take over the U.S.

I'm afraid that things are gonna get much worse in this country before they get better. Should those of us who oppose the neocon/Dominionist agenda quietly wait for the knock on our doors if/when they come to take us or kill us, or should we arm ourselves for that day. Our Founding Fathers foresaw this day when they wrote the Second Amendment. At the very least, this should let the fascist theocrats that we're not gonna go quietly into the night, that if/when they come for us, we're gonna take a few of them with us, that they're not taking us down without a fight. Armed private citizens freed this land from the last King George, and that's what may be necessary again.

HEY RUBE!!! Isn't that what the old carny's used to yell if somebody started trouble in the geek show. This seems to be a good time to sound off( I rub my hands with glee and prepare to knock a preacher on his ass). I use the side-show reference because I haven't ever seen a more apt description of what religion does than that. "Step right up" is the cry of the barker and first there is the magician who is pulling rabbits and flowers and god out of his hat. Next is the Singer from lands beyond imagination with a voice of pure gold to transport you to bliss unknown in your menial life. Then here comes the bearded lady and the alligator boy who show us that an unwholesome life can be trouble but coming back to the saviour will heal you. Finally comes the man you've been waiting for, the Daredevil. For the tip he can battle a world of sin with his voice and drive back Satan by the sheer joy he feels in serving his saviour. Then comes the blowoff where he saves the congregation from evil by convincing them that, for
just a pittance really, he can personally insure that god will now fight for you. Now just multiply that side-show by the number of churches in your town and you get an idea of how hard we have to work to defeat this menace. Any ideas for a better side-show?

I have some corrections for the original posting about secular America being threatened by Christianity is completely wrong in many historical points which were made by the author of the original posting.

First of all, the US Bill of Rights does not specifically state that only minorities should have their civil rights protected and respected by the government. In reality the historical documentation from the time the Bill of Rights were ratified shows that they intended the rights of ALL AMERICANS to be respected, with preference being given to no person or group over others.

James Madison who was considered the father of the Constitution, submitted the original text of the Bill of Rights based upon the Virginia Declaration of Rights. In the text of the first amendment James wrote "The civil rights of NONE (meaning no citizen) shall be abridged on account of their religious beliefs..." So how our present day courts continue to interpret the Bill of Rights to be about protecting the rights of the minorities exclusively, shows the ignorance of many judges and american citizens on the issue. In addition, the founding fathers and those who were their "posterity" celebrated religious services in various federal government buildings all the way up until the civil war. So this proves they never intended on the federal government to become hostile to the free worship of religion by the citizens, especially while the citizens were on public property.

The day that the non-Christians respect the civil rights of Christians is the day that these secular humanists and atheists can begin to argue. But as of now, we are living in a time when these secular humanists and atheists are attempting to rewrite the history of our nation as well as the real views of those who founded our nation.

Think it can't happen? Read some history-especially the part about witch burnings, book burnings, etc. We simply can't stand idily by while a small minority of religion-besotted halfwits take over. If these words are offensive to those who think the universe is run by supernatural forces, GOOD! This is exactly what all THINKING people must do-confront these fools directly.

I feel sad that the first comment I read in response to the article was full of hate speech. But when you caricature and demonize a whole group of people it's easy to hate them and think they are the worst thing in the world.

Ironically, I usually read the 'Conservative' news, which does exactly the same thing, except the 'Liberals' are the enemy.

To be honest, as a Christian with a conservative bent, what concerns me are incidents like kids who can't voluntarily read their Bibles on lunch break because some school district is terrified of being sued for breaking the Establishment Cause. Or the hegemony of political correctness, which is, in reality, a form of thought control.

Ideological extremism, includes but is not limited to religious types. I just read an article about North Korea's 'concentration camps' and the hideous torture that goes on there. May I remind people that these folks are anti-religious to the core as are other governments that have systematically oppressed and tortured their people.

You know why I DON'T want a theocracy? Because Christians from denomination X would try to impose their particular flavor of Christianity on everybody else, including me. I actually had this guy on a Christian forum try to 'expose' me because he didn't agree with me theologically and felt that I was going to infect the forum with false religion! I don't want people like him running the country. What a nightmare. What I do want to uphold is the Judeo-Christian value system this country was founded on.

Well thanks for listening. I'm sure there are plenty of 'Christian' sounding crackpots out there but they aren't worth getting worked up about.

I've emailed this story off to three acquaintances who have in the last few days sent me Christian based propaganda emails that are so very righteous. I've made the decision to stand up against this stuff and tell the senders that they are being used by the Christian Right, the same morons who put Bush and his incompetents in charge of our country.

The hate goes on. The left is doomed because it is more interested in being self-righteously correct than in building coalitions. I predicted that someone would say that no bridge-building is possible, and darned if one of the first responses didn't say exactly that. I've heard it so many times before, and it's a recipe for catastrophe for our children and grandchildren.

If the left is about something besides infantile pseudo-Stalinist rhetoric, then it has to get off its collective ass and compete in the field of ideas and institution building. And that means, oh no! loving your enemy enough to talk to them. I know very few secular progressives who are willing to do anything but rant about religion. They are as "fundamentalist" and intolerant as the right wingers on this issue. It's ahistorical, it's bad tactics, it's unethical, it has no more respect for logic and science than do the Biblical literalists. People love to say on here that "reality will win out over fantasy." Couldn't agree more. Reality is accepting that most humans believe in invisible things, and you are unlikely to change that. Fantasy is believing that you can win elections or change policy or transform civil society while casually insulting most of the population. It isn't working for the people discussed in the original piece (despite the fears of the author), and it won't work for the left, either.

I don't want to rehash what others have already written, but I don't have time to read every comment.

To begin with, Jesus is not a member of the religious right, and neither is he a member of any other group. I think that living overseas for the past three semesters has winged me away from blind allegiance to the religious right. It's really difficult and counterproductive to defend GWB every day, and so I've started feigning ignorance. And anyways, in the large scheme of things it doesn't really matter whether GWB is thought of as a villain or a hero. But what people think about Jesus does matter.

I think that Jesus can best be described with two words--grace and truth. Recently, I was talking to a friend about the idea of sin. He comes from a Buddhist background, but I think his ideas are similar to America's moral relativism so I thought it worthwhile to include them. He claimed that being less than perfect does not neccessarily equal sin, while I made a claim that sin is anything less than all the time loving everybody. He supported his claim by using the golden mean. Everything should come in moderation. I, on the otherhand, was claiming absolute truth. The most obvious problem with the golden mean and other claims of no absolute truth is that they are self-contradictory. For example, should we use the golden mean in modernation? Is there absolutely no absolute truth? With this said, I think that most people will agree that absolute truth exists. There will still be disagreement on what is absolute truth or whether we can even know what it is.

I think one of the biggest objections to Jesus in America is his claim of absolute truth. He claims that "no one comes to the Father except through him." It's an intolerant and narrow view, but is it true?

Believing in Jesus is said to be irrational. In fact, a belief in the supernatural is also said to be so.

Thus, when a someone claims that Jesus rose from the dead, they are said to be unreasonable. In other words, because the supernatural does not occur, then the resurrection could not occur because it is supernatural. If this isn't circular reasoning, I don't know what is.

Another obstacle to believing in Jesus is the popular theory of evolution. If we evolved from monkeys, and monkeys evolved from smaller monkeys, deng deng... then we no longer need an intelligent creator to explain our origin and purpose. I have a few problems with this explanation of our origins.

The first is how complex life is. Complexity screams design. I look out my window at a few thousand skyscrapers (maybe that's an exagerration), and I know each has an architect.

Another problem is that it raises more questions. How did the first cell form? If we can't create new species of animals in the laboratory using very intelligent scientists, why should we believe that random chance can do it? And, where did matter and energy come from?

My last objection that I'll mention is I've never seen evolution occur. Yes, I've seen it occur within a species. We have many types of dogs and cats, but I've never a dog become a cat. In fact, nobody has seen evolution occur during written history. Is it reasonable to believe that animals were created according to their kind as Genesis claims because man has seen no exceptions? I realize this last objection is pretty ridiculous, and is easily answered by claiming that evolution occurs over a long period of time. I brought it up to make a point. How many people say they do not believe in God because they haven't seen him?

Well, that was a novel about truth. The other characteristic that I mentioned was grace. I recommend a book called "Blue Like Jazz" to gain a better perspective on what Jesus teaches about grace.

You people are completely selfish. You want to blame George Bush on Christianity just so you can have an excuse to orgy, sodomize each other, fornicate, take drugs, and murder your babies.

Most of us agree George Bush is a monster. Every day more and more people wake up to the facts that 9/11 was an inside job.

I am a fundamentalist, King James Only Christian. I believe every single word of the Bible. I also despise George Bush. The Bush family are Luciferians. GWB the first is a flaming pedophile. They all are thoroughly selfish. It's pretty darn selfish to torture a little kid to death for a 10 minute thrill.

But many of you people think nothing of torturing your own unborn babies to death for a ten-minute thrill, so how does that make you any better than George Bush the I or II?

You are just as selfish. You don't care about the innocents being bombed into the Stone Age in Iraq. All you care about is now you have an excuse to say it's okay to orgy, fornicate, drug it up, and abort your own children.

So when Bush invades Iran and brings down WWIII on our heads and our enemies then turn around and destroy America, and you have to stand before God with nothing to offer but all your wicked deeds, these words so many of you have posted will come back to haunt you.

I meant the talk about gay rights, and how in the last election it was used to get the homophobes to get out and vote for bush and against civil liberties. That's what I meant. I didn't mean to bash homosexuals, their rights and life are as important as anyone, American, black, white or whatever, every human should have the same rights. However, the debate like many others, is manipulated so that people miss what's really happening. The religious self righteous will use words like immoral, and wrong to describe the gay lifestyle. I just thought the need to include gays because they are one of the most discriminated groups right now and their human rights are being absurdly abused. In this country rights are being taken away, and some were never even given.
Any couple can raise children, but you'll hear about someone saying in order to raise a child you need a father and mother.
"All you need is love. " not fear and hate (which at the base of it are the distraction.)

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