Set aside a couple of hours and watch this documentary about a fight in a town in North Carolina over whether a Christian flag (let that sink in for a sec) can be flown over a public monument to American military veterans. Rarely will you ever hear the religious speak so candidly.
You know, I’ve been accused of being paranoid about a particularly malignant form of fundamentalist Christianity. I’m not referring to mainstream Christians, like UCC, mainstream Presbyterians and Methodists, who for the most part are pretty harmless. I’m talking about Christians who take the bible literally. These are the kinds of people who would slaughter you if God told them to do it. They’re the kind of people who would deny their children blood transfusions.
It’s time we stopped giving them so much status and respect and started to make them prove themselves. What is that saying about extraordinary claims requiring extraordinary proof? Yeah, I’m thinking it’s time we started demanding that or subjecting the claimants to some well deserved ridicule.
When politicians start catering to religious fundamentalists for votes, the consequences to the culture can be quite serious. The Israelis are starting to understand what this means to women because the parties have been appealing to the ultra orthodox in recent years. Its been a disaster with little girls being spat upon for no covering up enough to professional female researchers being denied the right to address conferences or accept awards. Some of this behavior is being sanctioned by government officials on behalf of these ultra conservative Jews who traded their votes for enforcement of their particular brand of conservatism. And let’s not forget that in this country, Obama actively courted the evangelical vote in 2008. It shouldn’t be a surprise that they saw this as a green light to reinforce their socially conservative worldview to our detriment. How Obama approaches them this year will tell you a lot about what women and other disenfranchised groups can expect from the White House no matter who is elected.
Here’s the link. Prepare to be horrified, fascinated and scared shitless by these people.
Filed under: General | Tagged: fundamentalist Christians vs the rest of us, In God We Trust, North Carolina, Slavery |
The Confluence 
What I find encouraging is about half way through, there is a veteran who says he fought along side an American Muslim who struggles with his prejudice. I love that guy. He has a conscience and you can see his mind is really engaged, thinking critically about what it would mean to deny another person their right to worship or representation. It takes him awhile to figure it out because he’s got to fight through so much cultural baggage. But at the end, it makes a real breakthrough. If only do many others in this documentary had done that, I’d be a lot less worried.
What really pisses me off is the veterans who claim they went to Afghanistan to defend my right to live in a Christian nation. That angers me. I never approved of the extended occupation of Afghanistan and was 100% against the war in Iraq. I never bought it. But I sure as hell did not want anyone to go to war to defend my right to live in a Christian nation. And if that’s what they think they’re over there for, well, they can stop now and get out.
It’s regrettable that they were sent to fight a war by self-serving men. Don’t make it worse by turning it into a crusade that we secularists would never approve of.
I couldn’t access the clip but I don’t need to see it to know that demanding that a Christian flag be flown over a public monument to the fallen who likely embraced a variety of beliefs is wrong. As a Christian who does not believe that the Bible is inerrant, I think that we need to stand against the increasingly aggressive wave of ultra-conservative religious organizations that are trying to control all aspects of our lives, public and private. It’s damaging our country and limiting our freedoms in ways we can only imagine.
I once worked for a Christian who had been been turned from a life of alcoholism and frequent patronage of prostitutes by Jimmy Swaggart, of all people. While that behavior changed, he hounded me repeatedly, telling me that it was my Christian duty to drop a sex discrimination complaint against another supervisor who had significantly impacted my ability to do my job with his actions. I had to threaten him with a religious discrimination complaint to stop his harassment. I believe that faith can be a force for good in the world but not if it’s used as a hammer.
If the US describes itself as a Christian nation, perhaps it should be sued for misrepresentation.
I’ve alway likened this form of Christianity to the Cargo Cults that got started in the Pacific Ocean islands. The practitioners think their rituals will bring them material rewards.
Here’s a thought that demonstrates the level of national insanity here in the Big PX. We fought proxy wars in Korea and South Vietnam against the Chinese losing thousands of men and women. Today we trade with both nations. Now, compare that to Cuba where there have been no direct combat deaths but we have under sanction.
I predict that these Christian cults will only grow stronger.