* The Tea
Party is only the most famous example of "Christian Dominionism".
* "Christian Dominionism" as False Christianity [link].
* Theocracy taking hold in Vallejo: Christian Dominionism [
link]
, Human Rights abuse in Vallejo, "the City of God" [
link]
The New Apostolic Reformation (Christian
Dominionism) is a cult which worships the dictates of an appointed
"Apostle" who claims to speak for an invisible "god" and who worships
capitalism (the love of money).
Elsewhere
in the United States of America, this ideology of religious Fascists,
called "Dominionists" by the media, have taken control of various
jurisdictions, including entire States... Where ever they rule, they
impose their vision, including:
*
providing indoctrination at Privatized and Public Prisons, where inmates
become re-educated as "good Christians" in exchange for better
treatment, meanwhile the same Dominionist-ruled prisons are documented
as torturing Muslims and Civil-Rights Activists!!!
*
Support terrorism against non-Christian governments around the world by
allowing the jurisdictional government under their control to wholly
participate in fascist clandestine operations in alliance with Christian
terrorists around the world...
*
Destroying Freedoms such as obtaining organic medicine from Cannabis,
same-sex marriage, disrupting legitimate civil disobedience, and a hell
of alot more!
A
clandestine "New Apostolic Reformation" political party calling
themselves "The Family" are the core group governing the believers in
the "Dominion" ideology, and "The Family"
literally believes the anti-Christ is alive, that they have personally
trained him, and they will establish "His" rule in order to Bring
Forward the Helter-Skelter to fulfill the "2000 year old prophecy"
supposedly contained in the Bible which ends with the 2nd arrival of
"Heavenly Lord Master Messiah Jesus Blood-of-God Christ", sitting on
a throne with the Holy Three of the Trinity, and legions of winged people equipped like Roman soldiers, all on a
cloud, in orbit, somewhere beyond Jupiter or Earth's moon [this is what
they sincerely believe]...
"The Nehemiah Plan, excerpt"
posted 2013-08-12 by Bruce Wilson [
youtube.com/watch?v=ds_a3j-BMk0]:
PA Candidate Max Myers, "supernatural theocratic leadership"
posted 2013-03-19 by Bruce Wilson [
youtube.com/watch?v=IGeg1qLb7kQ]:
Their ideology includes the following set of Old Testament Laws:
(All quotes from the Old Testament of the Christian Bible)
* (Labor Rights) Exodus 21:20-21 "
And if a man smite his servant, or his maid, with a rod, and he die under his hand; he shall be surely punished. Notwithstanding, if he continue a day or two, he shall not be punished: for he is his money."
* (Women's Rights) Deuteronomy 22:20-1 "
If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl’s virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house."
* (Human Rights) Leviticus 25:44-45 "
Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property."
* (International Law) Deuteronomy 7:1-2 "
When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations . . . then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy."
Christian Dominionism as an ideology of tyranny -
As
evidence by the Christian Dominionist's loyalty to the law against
homosexuality as contained in the Book of Leviticus, what other laws do
they also claim loyalty to? Dr Laura Schlesinger, during her nationally
syndicated and Christian-oriented radio show, said that according to
Leviticus 18:22 homosexuality is an abomination, and cannot be tolerated
under any circumstance (for the record, Laura is of the orthodox Jewish
faith). The following is an open letter to Dr. Laura, written by James
M. Kauffman, Professor Emeritus of the Dept. Of Curriculum, Instruction,
and Special Education at the University of Virginia:
Dear Dr. Laura: Thank
you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have
learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge
with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the
homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus
18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination ... End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other elements of God's Laws and how to follow them.
1.
Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are from neighboring nations.
A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans (colored), but
not Canadians (white). Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?
2.
I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus
21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for
her?
3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while
she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15: 19-24. The
problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take
offense.
4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I
know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is
my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I
smite them?
5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the
Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I
morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do
it?
6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish
is an abomination, Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than
homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this? Are there "degrees"
of abomination?
7. Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the
altar of God, if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I
wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some
wiggle-room here?
8. Most of my male friends get their hair
trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is
expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?
9. I know
from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean,
but may I still play football, if I wear gloves?
10. My uncle
has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the
same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different
kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and
blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of
getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't
we just burn them to death at a private family affair, like we do with
people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14).
I know you
have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable
expertise in such matters, so I'm confident you can help.
Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.
Your adoring fan, James M. Kauffman
Pastor Robert Jeffress: "Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)" is preparing people for the Anti-Christ (2014-01) [
link]
"Christian Dominionist" organizations are comparable to political action organizations.
"IRS Cautions Churches About Rules On Politics From The Pulpit"
2012-06-04 by Stephen D. Foster Jr. [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/06/04/p/]
For
a few years now, right-wing leaning church leaders have consistently
stepped over the line to become deeply involved in politics. They have
heavily criticized President Obama and have made every effort to inject
religion into policy, all while remaining tax-exempt organizations. And
finally, the IRS may have had enough.
According to KWTX 10 News:
[begin excerpt] IRS regional manager Peter Lorenzetti told pastors
attending the Faith Leaders Summit meeting in Washington that activities
that could result in loss of tax-exempt status include endorsing or
opposing candidates, campaigning for them or making contributions to
their campaigns. [end excerpt]
There is a loophole for pastors to
exploit, however. As long as they claim to be acting in the capacity of a
private citizen, pastors can do all of the above with impunity. They
can also hand out voter guides that “educate” about issues.
I
think most of us would agree that churches and their leaders have stuck
their noses into political matters long enough. And their interference
has been quite devastating to the country. The Catholic Church in
particular has been very vocal in the political realm, opposing
everything from contraception, to Planned Parenthood, to same-sex
marriage and health care. And the Catholic Church has done this all
while pulling in a whopping $2.9 billion in taxpayer money. And the
Church doesn’t pay one dime in taxes. So while the crazy right-wing
priests of the Church complain about government policy, and criticize
President Obama while touting conservatism, they’re literally rolling in
billions of dollars of tax-free federal cash.
It’s not just the
Catholic Church though. Many other churches have also pushed their way
into politics, all while waving their tax-exempt status in our faces.One
LDS Church leader solicited funding for Mitt Romney, which is a
violation of the law. Some church leaders have even managed to use the
church to hide their assets. For instance, Rev. John Hagee reorganized
his TV station (Global Evangelism Television) as a church (Grace Church
of San Antonio Churches) to shelter those records, after the San
AntonioExpress-News revealed his income exceeded $1 million in 2001. All
of his assets, including an 8,000-or-so acre ranch, are now sheltered
in the Cornerstone Church. In other words, Hagee hides his millions in
assets in his church and escapes taxation on his own personal wealth and
property. Undoubtedly other so called “men of God” have done this. So
why not revoke the tax exempt status of mega-churches? They already make
millions and get involved in politics, so why not tax them?
Right-wing
preachers around the country have made it clear that they intend to
lobby heavily in support of Republicans and conservative policies this
year. Perhaps if Americans lobby the IRS long and hard enough,
right-wing church leaders will lose their status, and be held liable for
their actions and words. ‘Tax The Churches’ should be the next great
chant Americans cry out this political season.
"How Christian Dominionists Combat Reality"
2012-03-05 by Justin Rosario [
addictinginfo.org/2012/03/05/the-march-of-christian-dominionism-3-how-christian-dominionists-combat-reality/]:
So
how is the Christian Dominionist movement different than the regular
old Religious Right? On the surface they seem pretty much identical:
both pursue social politics, both proclaim that family values are of
prime importance, both encourage divisive bigotry of one form or another
and both raise millions by appealing to the baser instincts of their
followers. It is not easy to discern where they separate because
Dominionists are not very vocal about their deeper plans for the country
with outsiders.
The Religious Right is many things, but they do
not actively work towards the destruction and replacement of the
government with a Theocracy. Of course, this is exactly what Christian
Dominionists want and the Religious Right is complicit in their drive to
obtain it. These last two sentences might seem to be actively at odds
with one another. They are not. The Religious Right is more than willing
to make nice with groups they would ordinarily despise to further their
agenda. One need look no further than the pro-Israel stance of the GOP
for evidence of this. The vigor with which the Right defends Israel is a
wonder to behold until you realize that the whole point of supporting
Israel is so that the Israelis can rebuild the temple of Solomon and
fulfill one of the key requirements of the end time prophecies. By the
way, these prophecies also clearly state that most of the Jewish race
will be exterminated at that time. I’m guessing the Religious Right
doesn’t discuss that part too much with the Israelis.
In any
event, Christian Dominionism is very much like the dreaded threat of
“creeping Sharia” that has so many on the Right supposedly scared silly.
A way of life that is antithetical to a secular democracy is slowly
being enacted throughout the country. We shouldn’t even give a second
glance to the “threat” of Sharia in this country when a much clearer and
more present danger is among us. This is not to say that there aren’t
people who would love to see Sharia law implemented in the United
States. There certainly are. They simply don’t have a snowball’s chance
in hell of making it happen. Even in the dreaded Dearborn, Michigan.
These religious fanatics do, however, make an excellent boogeyman for
all manner of unscrupulous people. To the Dominionist, it is a way of
forcing people to make a false “choice”: Will you allow Sharia to
overrun the country or will you embrace God’s Law like all good
Christians do?
This is, of course, ridiculous. One simply needs
only embrace the Constitution to ward off the eeeeevils of Sharia. That
doesn’t work well for Christian Dominionists for reasons that should be
self-evident at this point. The Constitution explicitly states that
religion and government are not to be mixed, and so it has become a
Crusade among Dominionists to rewrite history. This is, perhaps, the
single most dangerous aspect of their agenda, the wholesale erasure and
replacement of reality and history with a more, shall we say, divine
interpretation.
There are a number of reasons history and, to an
almost equal extent, science are a threat to the “Christian” future.
History tells us who we are and where we came from. George Orwell was
entirely too aware of the need tyrants have to control over this
information. In his seminal work, “1984,” Orwell called the apparatus
put in place to accomplish this task the “Ministry of Truth.” They were
in charge of making sure “history” reflected whatever current day agenda
was in effect. With a push of a button, a war that had been raging for
years with one enemy becomes a war that had been raging for all that
same time with a completely different one. The State must be infallible.
In
the same fashion, after centuries of understanding the First Amendment,
specifically the Establishment Clause, of the Constitution in a very
specific manner based on the words and intent of the founding Fathers,
there are now questions. Despite numerous examples of most of the
Fathers being Deists (not ascribing to a particular organized religion
or even, necessarily, a supernatural force) or even actively derisive of
Christianity, Dominionists insist that not only was the country founded
on Judeo-Christian principles but that the Constitution is expressly a
religious document despite it not containing a single word to that
effect.
Once sufficient doubt is cast upon the secular nature of
our country’s founding document, everything and anything becomes
malleable. Please note that I use the word “sufficient” instead of
“legitimate.” “Legitimate” would mean that there is a real debate over
the facts. There is not. We have handwritten letters that explicitly
state the original intent (there’s a reason Texas is trying to remove
Jefferson from history text books) and they leave no room for doubt
about their intent towards government and religion. But this is beside
the point. Dominionists are more than happy to tell their flock whatever
they want, secure in the knowledge that they will not question. To
question is to lack faith. Ignorance is strength.
This is the
genius of politicized religion. Once a person is a true “believer,”
regardless of whether they actually believe or are too terrified of
expulsion to admit they do not, they will consequently accept any lie
they are fed. This serves the dual purpose of making any claim about how
the country should be run seem perfectly normal and also of further
isolating the flock: Of course the United States should be run according
to Biblical law, the Constitution was divinely inspired, and who could
possibly doubt that? Anyone that says otherwise is a liar and probably
an atheist Communist Marxist unpatriotic traitor. It doesn’t matter how
much evidence they provide or how solid their argument. They MUST be
lying.
This artificial schizophrenia extends to the realm of
science as well. I say “artificial schizophrenia” because, in the
phantasmagorical world of the Dominionist, everyday life is completely
divorced from empirical reality. Miracles and prayer will solve all
problems and if your particular problem is not solved in this way, the
fault lies with your lack of faith. Again, some of the less religiously
inclined are snickering that all religious people think this way. Don’t
make me hit you with a rolled up newspaper! Those thoroughly ensnared in
the corrupt mythology of Dominionism have no choice but to believe that
every aspect of their life is being directly controlled. Cause and
effect are as illusory as free will.
Now is when the massive
assaults on science and education come into play. I’ve written about
this before as well (Why do conservatives hate science so much? Or “How I
learned not to learn and trust my beer gut instead” [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/questions/“why-do-conservatives-hate-science-so-much”-or-“how-i-learned-not-to-learn-and-trust-my-beer-gut-instead-”/])
but it bears a re-examination in the light of Dominionism. Science is
the natural enemy of Fundamentalism and, by extension, Dominionism.
Science encourages critical thinking and free inquiry, concepts that are
pure anathema to a totalitarian religious philosophy. Science also
reduces mankind from a divine creature, put on the earth to rule, to a
not exactly random result of natural processes. We’re still the top of
the food chain but only due to our unique and innate intellect, not
because we were “meant” to be.
Without the divine origins of man,
Dominionism loses much of its self-granted authority. If the Bible is
not literally true, then religion becomes merely a guide for living a
moral life and not the source of all morality and knowledge as
Dominionists claim. To combat this, there has been a war waged against
science in general and public education in specific for decades.
As
I’ve said before, an uneducated population is far easier to manipulate
and control. It’s hard to think of how to make the world a better place
when you don’t know HOW to think. When you’ve been raised to believe
that there is ALWAYS a Biblical answer to every question, it becomes so
easy to dismiss actual experts and only listen to the side that says
what you want to hear. It doesn’t matter that the religious argument can
provide no solid evidence or facts, you don’t know how to judge for
yourself anyway. This is the point of the Right Wing’s war on education
and it’s all about defunding schools and colleges.
The Right wants
to divert tax dollars to for-profit charter schools that have not
proven to be any more effective than public schools (and that are far
less accountable). Not only does this starve public schools of vital
funds, but it enables the Right to complain how terrible public
education is. It’s an awesome racket: make schools dysfunctional by
underpaying teachers and ensuring the schools are run down and then use
this dysfunction as proof that public education is unworkable.
The
assault on colleges is different. The goal here is to raise tuitions so
high that the choice is either to not go at all or spend the next 20
years paying off loans. Why do you think Republicans howled in pain when
Obama did away with subsidized loans and cut out the extremely
unnecessary middle man? It was a one-two punch for the Right. Not only
did banks lose billions in revenue they did nothing to earn, it made
school loans less painful for those who need it the most. Notice that
this was not important enough to make any real news. Most of you reading
this didn’t even know it was part of the Health Care Reform package.
Obama tacked it on so the GOP couldn’t block it. Yet, you know all about
Anthony Weiner’s weiner. This should tell you something about the state
of the country.
So, to wit: make public schools function as
poorly as possible, especially in low income areas. Make college too
expensive for most to obtain a degree and then use the resulting failure
to justify further cuts and convince people that home schooling is the
best option. When you break the system of public education, the public
will look elsewhere to educate their children and home schooling is the
“answer.”
Home schooling is a rapidly expanding movement among the
Religious Right. And it is a huge part of their war on science and
history. Over one million children are currently being educated outside
of the public school system; many of them being indoctrinated into the
world of religious fanaticism. Do I sound alarmist? How does an entire
generation raised to believe “God said it. I believe it. That settles
it” sound to you? Does that sound like a group of people capable of
objectively assessing the challenges facing the country and the world?
Do you think they will be capable of overcoming their conditioning to
embrace any solution that is not fully “Christian?” Neither do I.
This
kind of parallel education has reached frightening heights as (former)
candidates like Michele Bachmann, and
maybe-maybe-not-but-who-can-really-tell-if-she’s-running Sarah Palin
spit out gems like ““The very founders that wrote those documents worked
tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States,” and “He who
warned uh, the British that they weren’t gonna be takin’ away our arms,
uh by ringing those bells…” on a regular basis. Mike Huckabee, another
powerful voice in conservative politics even has his own cartoon series
for home schooled children. In it, a group of plucky time travelling
kids can be found saying “What we see and hear isn’t always the same as
what we read in books or see on TV. So what? We know the truth and
that’s good enough for us!”
God said it. I believe it. That settles it!
So
we have an “army” of Christian Soldiers whose main weapons will be pure
ignorance, rigid, uncritical thought and blind obedience. Dominionists
have built an entire culture that is separated from the rest of the
world by a shield of dogma. They know how to insinuate themselves into
the government at some of the highest positions and they know how to
influence elections to their benefit. They have massive financial
backing from both their followers as well as corporations that may not
be interested in Dominionists’ social agenda but are very supportive of
their economic goals.
But how will you know if a particular policy
from the GOP is simple conservative greed or something darker and more
sinister? How will you recognize the Dominionist agenda? That’s the
question I will attempt to answer in last part of this series of liberal
slander: How Dominionists are trying to undermine our country Or “So
THAT’S why the GOP’s been doing that!!” [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/03/11/the-march-of-christian-dominionism-4-how-dominionists-are-trying-to-undermine-our-country/].
"The Evangelicals Engaged In Spiritual Warfare"
2011-08-24 from "National Public Radio" [
npr.org/2011/08/24/139781021/the-evangelicals-engaged-in-spiritual-warfare]:
An
emerging Christian movement that seeks to take dominion over politics,
business and culture in preparation for the end times and the return of
Jesus, is becoming more of a presence in American politics. The leaders
are considered apostles and prophets, gifted by God for this role.
The
international "apostolic and prophetic" movement has been dubbed by its
leading American architect, C. Peter Wagner, as the New Apostolic
Reformation (NAR). Although the movement is larger than the network
organized by Wagner — and not all members describe themselves as part of
Wagner's NAR — the so-called apostles and prophets of the movement have
identifiable ideology that separates them from other evangelicals.
Two
ministries in the movement planned and orchestrated Texas Gov. Rick
Perry's recent prayer rally, where apostles and prophets from around the
nation spoke or appeared onstage. The event was patterned after The
Call, held at locations around the globe and led by Lou Engle, who has
served in the Apostolic Council of Prophetic Elders of the NAR. Other
NAR apostles endorsed Perry's event, including two who lead a 50-state
"prayer warrior" network. Thomas Muthee, the Kenyan pastor who anointed
Sarah Palin at the Wasilla Assembly of God Church in 2005, while praying
for Jesus to protect her from the spirit of witchcraft, is also part of
this movement.
On Wednesday's Fresh Air, Rachel Tabachnick, who
researches the political impact of the religious right, joins Terry
Gross for a discussion about the growing movement and its influence and
connections in the political world.
Tabachnick says the movement
currently works with a variety of politicians and has a presence in all
50 states. It also has very strong opinions about the direction it wants
the country to take. For the past several years, she says, the NAR has
run a campaign to reclaim what it calls the "seven mountains of culture"
from demonic influence. The "mountains" are arts and entertainment;
business; family; government; media; religion; and education.
"They
teach quite literally that these 'mountains' have fallen under the
control of demonic influences in society," says Tabachnick. "And
therefore, they must reclaim them for God in order to bring about the
kingdom of God on Earth. ... The apostles teach what's called 'strategic
level spiritual warfare' [because they believe that the] reason why
there is sin and corruption and poverty on the Earth is because the
Earth is controlled by a hierarchy of demons under the authority of
Satan. So they teach not just evangelizing souls one by one, as we're
accustomed to hearing about. They teach that they will go into a
geographic region or a people group and conduct spiritual-warfare
activities in order to remove the demons from the entire population.
This is what they're doing that's quite fundamentally different than
other evangelical groups."
Rick Perry's Rally -
The
organizers of Perry's rally were from ministries founded by two
apostles/prophets of the movement — The Call, and the International
House of Prayer founded by Mike Bickle. Bickle, who led part of Perry's
event, has claimed that Oprah Winfrey is a precursor of the Antichrist,
and Engle has claimed that gay people are controlled by "demonic
spirits." Both have served on the Council of Prophetic Elders initiated
by Wagner.
"Lou Engle [has spoken] at length about how one of his
sons has started an International House of Prayer in the Castro district
of San Francisco and that his son is now expelling demons from
homosexuals, and supposedly then this cures them of their
homosexuality," says Tabachnick. "He has also held [prayer rallies]
around the world."
One of Engle's previous rallies took place in Uganda in May 2010, shortly after an anti-homosexuality bill had been proposed.
"Various
people got on the stage [at his rally] and promoted the
anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda, which is a very draconian bill that
would allow for executions for certain offenses, and would also allow
for people who don't report homosexual history to be jailed," she says.
"The apostles have had a long history in Uganda, and some of them have
had close relationships with both political and religious leaders there.
In fact, an apostle in Uganda takes credit for promoting the
anti-homosexuality bill and was recognized by the parliament in Uganda
when the bill was introduced."
Engle has another rally planned in
November in Detroit. The purpose of the prayer rally, says Tabachnick,
is to "fight the demonic spirit of Islam."
"In other words, [they
want] to conduct spiritual warfare against the spiritual demons which
they claim hold Muslims in bondage and keep them from converting," she
says. "Of course, this is expressed in terms of love. They say 'We don't
hate Muslims. We love Muslims. But we hate that they are in spiritual
bondage and don't convert to Christianity.' "
A 'Different' Evangelicalism -
Tabachnick,
who has been researching and writing about the apostles for a decade,
says her own religious background has helped her with her research. She
grew up as a Southern Baptist and converted to Judaism as an adult.
"Having
the Southern Baptist background and growing up in the Deep South has
helped me to be able to do this research and has also helped me realize
something that might not be apparent to some other people looking at the
movement," she says. "This is quite radically different than the
evangelicalism of my youth. The things that we've been talking about are
not representative of evangelicalism. They're not representative of
conservative evangelicalism. So I think that's important to keep in
mind. This is a movement that's growing in popularity, and one of the
ways they've been able to do that [is because] they're not very
identifiable to most people. They're just presented as nondenominational
or just Christian — but it is an identifiable movement now with an
identifiable ideology."
Interview Highlights -
Rachel
Tabachnick is an independent researcher and a contributor to Talk To
Action. She is also the co-founder of the blog NARWatch.
-
On the issues of the international "apostolic and prophetic" movement:
"[Their
issues are] anti-abortion, anti-gay rights — but they also have ... the
belief that government should not be involved in social safety nets,
that the country is becoming socialist, if not communist ... — all of
what we've come to call 'Tea Party issues' of very small government. In
the case of the apostles, they believe this because they believe that a
large government that handles the safety net is taking away what is the
domain of the church and of Christianity."
-
On dominionism:
"Dominionism
is simply that Christians of this belief system must take control over
the various institutions of society and government. Some things that
make this group unique is that they have some unusual concepts of what
they call spiritual warfare that have not been seen before in other
groups. Spiritual warfare is a common term in evangelicalism and in
Christianity, but they have some unique approaches and some unique spins
on this that distinguish them from other groups."
-
On Thomas Muthee's video series :
"The
process [in these videos] is that the people come together, repent,
pray together, expel the demons from their community — which they
describe in terms of witches and witchcraft — and then the community
undergoes a transformation in which there can be miraculous healing, the
growth of very large vegetables [and] the end of corruption and crime.
What was totally missed by the press was that Muthee was an
international leader in the [NAR] movement at the time and recognized
because of his role in this series of videos."
-
On the topics at Rick Perry's rally:
"The
major topics at these events [are] anti-abortion, anti-gay rights and
the conversion of Jews in order to advance the end times. And this was
very visible at Perry's events as these apostles led all of these
different prayers and repentance ceremonies at [his rally]."
Other articles about "Domionism" by "National Public Radio" -
* "The Books And Beliefs Shaping Michele Bachmann" [
npr.org/2011/08/09/139084313/the-books-and-beliefs-shaping-michele-bachmann]
* "Rick Perry's Religious Revival Sparks A Holy War" [
npr.org/2011/08/05/138995325/rick-perrys-religious-revival-sparks-a-holy-war]
* "A Refuge For Powerful Lawmakers" [
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130070569]
* "Finding The Root Of Anti-Gay Sentiment In Uganda" [
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129422524]
* "Ousted Evangelical Reflects On Faith, Future" [
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128776382]
* "When Right-Wing Extremism Moves Mainstream" [
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124906766]
* "The Secret Political Reach Of 'The Family'" [
npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120746516]
Nasty Nazi Zaniness!
"Council for National Policy" [
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_for_National_Policy]
[
http://65.175.91.69/Reformation_net/default.htm]
What is the Coalition on Revival?
The
Coalition on Revival is a network of evangelical leaders from many
major denominational and theological perspectives who share a vision for
and commitment to revival, renewal, and reformation of the Church and
society and to further discussion and implementation of a Biblical and
Christian worldview. COR's vision is to see Christians everywhere doing
all they can in the power of the Holy Spirit to take every thought
captive to the obedience of Christ in every aspect of life and worldview
area. COR's mission is "to help the Church rebuild civilization on the
principles of the Bible so God's will may be done on earth as it is in
heaven." We are committed implementing this Biblical worldview in every
way God gives us opportunity.
People of Anabaptist, Arminian,
Lutheran, Calvinist, and Wesleyan denominational backgrounds are
represented among COR’s leaders. Pre-, a-, and post-millennialists are
cooperating with each other, sharing the exciting task of getting God’s
will done on earth as it is in heaven insofar as that is possible
between now and whenever Christ comes back to Earth. Charismatics and
non-charismatics, covenant and dispensationalist theologians, have
joined arm in arm in prayer and hard work to develop and implement the
Biblical worldview through revival, renewal, and reformation in the
Christian Church and the American culture.
COR’s vision is to see
Christians everywhere doing all they can in the power of the Holy Spirit
to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Cor. 10:5),
which essentially means a biblical-Christian worldview. To that end we
have developed a series of worldview documents that set forth what we
believe are the fundamental and essential points of the total Christian
worldview and society. The COR worldview documents state what we believe
are the biblical principles for all worldview areas of human life
including theology, evangelism, discipleship, law, civil governments,
economics, education, family, medicine, psychology and counseling, arts
and media, business and professions, and science and technology. We
believe that these Biblical and Christian worldview documents state
where the entire Church must stand and what action it must take to
accomplish its task in this new millennium.
COR has, in the past,
brought together large groups of Christian leaders to produce a series
of foundational documents to guide the Church in its return to historic
orthodoxy. These documents include: The Manifesto for the Christian
Church, the 42 Articles on Historic Christian Doctrine, the 25 Articles
of Affirmation and Denial on the Kingdom of God, and a comprehensive
series of 17 Christian Worldview Documents that outline the Biblical
and Christian worldview in areas of life and thought. All these
documents are in turn based on the historic view of the Bible stated in
The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, created by the
International Council on Biblical Inerrancy, which COR's director, Dr.
Jay Grimstead, helped found and of which he was executive director in
the early years. In addition, COR has organized a massive theological
study and debate proposed to culminate in a global Church Council during
the early years of the new millennium.
Our Perspective
Wherever
God's people, His willingly obedient subjects, are obeying Him in every
aspect of their lives, there is where the King's Kingdom is being
brought forth in this world in time and space to implement His Biblical
worldview.
It is inconceivable that it could be logical or that it
could ever please the King to have His willing subjects bring their
spiritual, theological, and ecclesiastical lives under His dominion
without also bringing their families, finances, education, legal
matters, professional life, voting choices, involvement in the arts and
sciences, recreation, and physical health all under the King's dominion;
this in essence is living out the Christian and Biblical worldview.
The
Kingdom of God increases, advances, and becomes measurable in this
space-time world in every sphere of life, as more and more individuals
become truly regenerated, converted, discipled, and trained in Christian
biblical worldview to let their Christianity and their commitment to
the King's laws and values be expressed through the various facets and
relationships of their lives.
Wherever and whenever and to whatever
degree Christians are making a united stand in their societal groupings
for the concerns of their King Jesus, and are operating according to His
Kingdom's principles, exactly at that point is the Kingdom of God in
existence on this earth and the Christian Worldview being lived out.
When enough serious Christians thus influence, penetrate, and permeate
the various societal structures, and when those Christians are connected
together in a common fellowship and commitment around their common
Lord, that is when and where the Kingdom of God can be said to be
advancing through society during this age. The COR Christian worldview
documents are a good foundation and directive for this Kingdom effort.
View or print these documents with the free Acrobat Reader.
-
Twenty-Four Year Plan
Invitation Brochure
Christian Foundation
Documents
Biblical Inerrancy (Signatories)
42 Worldview Essentials
The Kingdom of God
Manifesto for the Church
Christian Worldview Documents
Worldview Law
Worldview Government
Worldview Social/Political
Worldview Education
Worldview Discipleship
Worldview Medicine
Worldview Psychol/Counseling
Worldview Science/Technology
Worldview Art/Media
Worldview Economics
Worldview Business/ Occupat.
Worldview Evangelism
Worldview Christian Unity
Worldview Family
Worldview Poor/Hurting
Worldview Pastoral Renewal
Worldview Colleges/Universities
Other Resources
Neo-Orthodox Falsehoods
Leader's Questions
Also see our daughter organization:
The International Church Council Project
2012-03-07
"How the Fundamentalist Mind Compels Conservative Christians to Force
Their Beliefs on You; Good people are willing to subvert the U.S.
Constitution and even violate human decency in their quest for converts"
by Valerie Tarico from "AlterNet"
[
http://www.alternet.org/belief/154460/how_the_fundamentalist_mind_compels_conservative_christians_to_force_their_beliefs_on_you?page=entire]
Valerie Tarico is a psychologist and writer in Seattle, Washington and
the founder of Wisdom Commons. She is the author of "Trusting Doubt: A
Former Evangelical Looks at Old Beliefs in a New Light" and "Deas and
Other Imaginings." Her articles can be found at Awaypoint.Wordpress.com.
---
Many
evangelicals wear their religion on T-shirts and around their necks and
on car bumpers and eye-blacks. They hand out tracts on college campuses
and stage revival meetings on military bases. They use weddings and
funerals to preach come-to-Jesus sermons. In their resolve to spread the
good news that Jesus saves, some also do things that are more morally
dubious.
In Tucson, nice young couples cultivate relationships
with lonely college students without disclosing that they are paid to
engage in “friendship missions.” [
http://www.friendshipevangelism.org/ministry.html]
In
Seattle, volunteers woo first- and second-graders to afterschool Good
News Clubs that the children are incapable of distinguishing from
school-sponsored activities [
http://augreaterseattle.org/GNC/index.html].
In Muslim countries, Christian missionaries skirt laws that ban
proselytizing by pretending to be mere aid workers, putting genuinely
secular aid workers at risk. In the U.S. military, soldiers bully other
soldiers into prayer meetings or the Passion of the Christ [
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-10-06-airforce-lawsuit_x.htm] and then send bizarrely profane emails to people who try to stop them [
http://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org/mrff_mail_reports/hatemail_report.pdf].
Perhaps
the most devastating consequence of evangelical zeal in recent decades
has been millions of unnecessary deaths in Africa. Many evangelicals saw
the HIV epidemic as an opportunity.
“AIDS has created an
evangelism opportunity for the body of Christ unlike any in history,”
said Ken Isaacs of Samaritan’s Purse [
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/01/pdf/pepfar.pdf].
Another group that pursued HIV dollars has its mission built right into
its name: Community Health Evangelism. Christian ideology ultimately
redirected billions of U. S. aid dollars away from science-based
results-oriented interventions such as contraceptive access and safe-sex
education and into programs that espoused traditional Christian values:
monogamy, evangelism, and compassionate after-the-fact care for the
sick [
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/01/pdf/pepfar.pdf].
I
spent over 20 years of my life as an evangelical Christian, and during
that time these behaviors seemed benign, even laudable to me. Today, as a
psychologist who creates resources for former fundamentalists, I find
them disturbing. Even so, I am sympathetic to the moral conundrum
fundamentalism can cause for genuinely decent people. After I watched
the documentary Jesus Camp, a friend commented, “Wasn’t that
horrifying?” I had to confess that it seemed kind of, well, normal --
and that I could relate to the woman running the camp.
To explain
why Christians will sometimes violate their own commitment to compassion
or truth in the search for converts, it helps to consider the
psychology of fundamentalist religion.
Religion has a set of
superpowers—ways it shapes or controls human thinking and behavior.
Chief among these is the fact that religions take charge of our moral
reasoning and emotions, giving divine sanction to some behaviors and
forbidding others [
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-literary-mind/200911/the-four-moral-emotions].
Because there are many kinds of “good,” all of us make moral decisions
by weighing values against each other. For example, most parents place a
value on not hurting their children and yet get them immunized because
long-term health trumps short-term pain. Religion can alter the way we
stack those competing values, adding emotional weight to some, removing
it from others.
The relationship between religion and morality is complicated. Religion claims credit for our moral instincts [
http://www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/pub/marc-hauser].
It channels them via specific prescriptions and prohibitions. It offers
explanations for why some things feel right and others feel so wrong
and why we find the wrong ones tempting [
http://www.sciencecodex.com/morality_research_sheds_light_on_the_origins_of_religion].
It engages us in stories and rituals that bring moral questions to the
fore in day-to-day life. It embeds us in a community that encourages
moral conformity and increases altruism toward insiders [
http://www.edge.org/discourse/moral_religion.html#haidt]. It creates the sense that someone is always watching over our shoulder [
http://www2.psych.ubc.ca/~ara/Manuscripts/Shariff_Norenzayan.pdf].
When
religious edicts align with the quest for love and truth, religion’s
power can encourage us to be more compassionate, kind, humble or act
with integrity. But religions also assert moral obligations that have
little to do with love or truth, harm or wellbeing. Consider, for
example, sacramental rituals, pilgrimages, circumcision, veiling, vows
of silence or rituals of purity [
http://www.mendeley.com/research/disgust-and-the-moralization-of-purity/].
Some demands of piety have little human or planetary cost. But other
times, divine edict compels adherents to do harm in the service of a
higher cause that to outsiders simply doesn’t exist. The Aztec and Inca
practice of human sacrifice to appease gods was one of these. To
outsiders it was a horrifying moral violation; to insiders more
analogous to a community vaccination; the young men and women who were
sacrificed gave their lives for a greater good—the wellbeing of the
whole society.
Since religions add to an adherent’s bucket of
moral obligations, they can create moral dilemmas or tradeoffs where
none would otherwise exist. Should I spend my days studying Torah or
working to feed my children? Should I drive my daughter to the hospital
even though it’s Friday? Should I give the little I can spare to the
poor or to the nuns? Should I wander with a beggar bowl or help my
father tend the fields so my sisters can go to school? Should I
encourage my poor African parishioners to wear condoms to prevent HIV or
tell them to entrust God with their family planning?
Sometimes
the tradeoffs are a matter of life or death, as when Saudi girls may
have been forced to remain in their burning school rather than flee
unveiled. Or consider the case of a young Arizona mother who had to
choose between her own death and the abortion of a 12-week fetus her
church deemed a person. She chose to live so she could continue raising
the children who waited for her at home. But her bishop, who saw the
abortion as premeditated murder, excommunicated a nun who helped her,
claiming the more moral path was to allow the death of both woman and
fetus as God’s will [
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/Media/church-excommunicates-nun-authorized-emergency-abortion-save-mothers/story?id=10799745].
Evangelical
Protestants who believe the Bible is the literally perfect word of God
take as one of their highest mandates a verse they call the Great
Commission. I have seen it emblazoned in letters two feet high on the
wall of a megachurch: Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
(Matthew 28:19, NIV). The word evangel means good news, and the name
evangelical identifies Christians whose beliefs center on spreading what
they think is the best news ever to reach the human race: that Jesus
died for our sins and anyone who believes can be saved from hell. (One
of my deep secrets as an evangelical teenager was how much I hated
trying to sell other people on the Four Spiritual Laws that laid out the
plan of salvation.)
Follow me, says the Jesus of Mark’s Gospel,
and I will make you fishers of men. For evangelical Christians, fishing
for souls is an obligation that can trump all others. What good does it
do to feed the hungry or tend the sick if you leave their souls to
eternal torture? Catholic Christians typically believe that good works
are of value in their own right. Universalist Christians believe that
the death of Jesus on the cross ultimately redeemed all of creation.
Modernist Christians believe the Bible is a human document and that the
life of Jesus is more important than his death. Evangelical Christians
believe they have a moral obligation to proselytize.
Beliefs have
consequences, and one consequence of evangelical belief is that decent
people end up doing ugly things in order to recruit converts and save
souls. It is because they care about being good that they do harm. In
the much quoted words of Steven Weinberg, “With or without religion, you
would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil
things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.” The
mechanism by which this happens is that religion creates a narrative in
which the evil serves a higher good.
A new book by Mikey Weinstein, No Snowflake in an Avalanche [
http://www.amazon.com/Snowflake-Avalanche-Michael-Mikey-Weinstein/dp/0983925534],
offers a window into how corrosive the Great Commission can be. It
chronicles a harrowing decade in, what is to Weinstein, a fight to the
death for religious freedom. You may be familiar with fragments of the
story. When fundamentalist Christians at the Air Force Academy began
goading and harassing Weinstein’s cadet son, Curtis, they awoke a
grizzly bear.
Weinstein assumed at first that the harassment was
an anomaly and would be addressed quickly. Alas. The more pressure he
applied using his own standing as an Academy graduate and former Reagan
administration attorney, the more he uncovered an entrenched network of
fundamentalist Christians that ranged from cadets to chaplaincy to
brass, and that pressured all others to convert: Clubbish
Bible-believing cadets bullied Catholics, Muslims, Jews, nontheists and
even mainline Protestants (who, after all, weren’t real Christians to
them). Evangelical chaplains brazenly told supporters they were
missionaries on the public dime and the armed services was their mission
field. Righteous officers pulled rank and pressured subordinates to
participate in Bible studies and prayer meetings –and covered up abuses.
Middle Easterners complained that America’s troops were Christian
crusaders, and outside organizations fanned the flames by providing
tracts and Bibles so that combat soldiers could work on converting Iraqi
and Afghan civilians.
Livid about violations against the U.S.
Constitution and livid about the personal violations and added dangers
being endured by America’s soldiers because of the crusade mentality,
Weinstein formed the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) [
http://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org/].
Since then, thousands of phone calls, letters and emails have poured in
from all arms of the services--not only from the academies but from men
and women whose lives are on the line in war zones. The MRFF has fought
like a cornered lion on their behalf—fierce, muscular and
unpredictable—leaving fundamentalist perpetrators convinced that
Weinstein and his colleagues are agents of Satan.
As exposure
after exposure has demonstrated, the evangelizers are legally in the
wrong. They also are in violation of well-established moral and ethical
principles including, often, humanity’s most central moral principle,
the Golden Rule [
http://www.augustana.ab.ca/~mohrj/courses/2007.winter/csc490/notes/ethics.html].
They would be outraged if adherents of other religions solicited their
children or exploited their collegial relationships in the quest for
converts. So why don’t they give it up? They can’t. Their beliefs
require that they push as hard as they can to implement their
understanding of God’s will.
In recent years, evangelicals have
expanded their outreach in the military, public grade schools,
"faith-based” community services and international aid programs,
leveraging existing structures and secular funding streams when possible
to support their work. To qualify for grants or gain access to public
facilities, they argue that they are social service providers, not
missionaries. From a personnel standpoint they argue that they are
churches, exempt from civil rights laws. America’s Supreme Court has
been remarkably willing to let them speak out of both sides of their
mouths, which means this trend will continue [
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/supreme-court-offers-victory-to-world-vision-in-religious-discrimination-lawsuit/].
Evangelical organizations like Officers Christian Fellowship, Child
Evangelism Fellowship, Prison Fellowship Ministries and World Vision
will proselytize as much as they are allowed to, diverting as many
public dollars as they can, because that is what their reading of the
Bible demands.
Inside and outside of Christianity, vigorous
debate is challenging the pillars of fundamentalist belief, like the
idea that the Bible is literally perfect or that Jesus was the ultimate
human sacrifice. But the evangelical quest for converts will be
constrained only by whatever moral limits the rest of us set.
2012-02-27 "The March of Christian Dominionism 1: What Is Christian Dominionism?"
by Justin "Filthy Liberal Scum" Rosario [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/02/27/christian-dominionism/]:
No. It’s not. And it never was.
Or “Welcome to the Theocratic States of America”
Thirty
years from now, a protestor stands alone on a corner. She is visibly
pregnant. Her sign, written in blood red marker, says “I’m carrying my
rapist’s baby! Thanks a lot, Jesus!” She has only been there for five
minutes but has been called “slut” and “whore” by several passersby. One
elderly woman stops long enough to tell her she deserved to be raped
for not loving Jesus enough. Others look at her with sad eyes but
quickly avert their gaze lest one of their neighbors notice.
Finally
the police arrive to take the woman into custody. She has not spoken a
word. She has no bullhorn. She has not accosted a single person on the
street. Yet she is still arrested by men who barely contain their
contempt for her. She has broken no laws that we would recognize but
still, she is roughly handcuffed and placed in the back of a police
cruiser. Of course, they take great care not to harm the baby she is
carrying; the bruises she’ll have later won’t be anywhere near
life-threatening. In this, she is lucky to be pregnant; others do not
fare as well.
She is not read her rights because she has none. She is
a blasphemer against the Lord and has been stripped of all legal
protections. Her pregnancy will ensure that she survives long enough to
perhaps repent and beg forgiveness. If not, she will be stoned to death
in a public square by devout followers. Her child will be raised by the
State to be a patriotic, loyal and, above all, God fearing citizen.
Welcome to the Theocratic States of America.
This
may seem like a scenario out of a bad science fiction film but you
would be wrong. This is what the world should be according to Christian
Dominionism.
What is Christian Dominionism? It’s exactly what it
sounds like: a world dominated by Christianity. Not just under the
control of Christianity but completely and utterly dominated by it.
According to Dominionists, every aspect of our lives is subject to the
strictures of the Bible. Our personal lives and social lives must be
lived in accordance with the word of God. Economics, politics, science,
the arts and the law are all to be placed under the auspices of
Christianity. It is, in essence, exactly what people claim Sharia law
is. Minus Islam.
Such a system is, by its very nature, a totalitarian
one. There can be no freedom of expression. There can be no free press.
There can be no freedoms of any kind except the freedom to obey the
Word. This is a very appealing concept to those interested in power for
its own sake. Such a concentration of power would be free of morality,
ethics, decency or accountability of any kind. The ability to shape the
world at will is very alluring and the perversion of religion is a
powerful tool to reach that goal.
At the same time, to those without
power or hope, the idea of surrendering to such total control is more
than a soothing balm; it is something to be craved. The world remains
cold and indifferent to the struggles and pain we all go through.
Self-direction can be hard and messy. Deciding what is right and what is
wrong by relying on your own moral compass can be exhausting. In an
environment where a steady diet of pious, theocratic messaging can make
it seem a virtue to let someone else tell you how to live and what to
believe it is easy to surrender control. At that point, the absolute
moral certainty of Dominionists becomes an anesthetic for the confusion
and doubt of the everyday world. Is it any wonder the desperate seek it
like an oasis in the desert?
Let us clear up two possible
misconceptions; while I am an atheist, this article is not an “ATTACK ON
CHRISTIANITY!!” as many on the Right, and no small amount on the Left,
will claim. This is NOT about religion at all, that is, beyond its use
as a means to an end. Dominionists do not care about the teachings of
Jesus. They care about the control those teachings will provide over the
desperate, the lost and the wounded. Their cries of persecution by evil
liberal God-hating heathens like me are camouflage. By wrapping
themselves in the trappings of piety, they deflect, successfully if you
allow it, any direct critique of their agenda.
This creates an
obstacle on both ends of the political spectrum. First, while
Dominionists are always found among conservatives, not all conservatives
are even remotely Dominionists. The problem is that many on the Right
use religion in much the same way: as a prop to claim a moral high
ground they have laughably failed to reach. This makes it difficult for
Right Wing opportunists to separate themselves from the Christian
Dominionism movement. In fact, it is nigh impossible to reveal
Dominionists for the power hungry hypocrites they are without leaving
themselves open to the very same charge. How does the wolf in sheep’s
clothing denounce the other wolf hunting the same flock and stay hidden?
On
the other hand, the Left does what is ALWAYS does: refuse to make
judgments. Oh sure, they’ll cluck their tongues and shake their heads
but they won’t meet the threat because they are afraid of being accused
of secularism or not being “tolerant” of diverse viewpoints. Excuse me,
but that is load of bull puckey! Should we “tolerate” the Taliban? Or
Eugenicists?[i] Better yet, WHY should we “tolerate” a group that seeks
to install a theocracy where democracy now flourishes? It is madness to
think otherwise but that is exactly what liberals do. Terrified of
offending someone, somewhere, many stand impotently by and wring their
hands when faced with anything that falsely cloaks itself in piety.
Of
course, we’re not ALL afraid of our shadow. Some of us are proud to be
filthy liberal scum and we don’t give a sack of beans about hurting
someone’s feelings. Sometimes it really is OK to yell “FIRE!” in a
crowded theater. Particularly when the theater really is on fire!
The
other most likely misconception is that this is a full on assault
against the Right. Well, yes and no. Don’t get me wrong, I despise the
Right Wing of this country and take pretty much every opportunity to
knock the GOP as the greedy, selfish, corporate whores that they are,
but this is less about the conservative movement than it is about a
specific subset of it. You could write an entire book about how much
you hate Catholics or Mormons and still not have anything negative to
say about Christianity itself. In fact, Christians do this all the time.
Dominionists, however, naturally gravitate to the Right because, among
other things, that is where the anger and fear is. Christian Dominionism
relies heavily on these two emotions to attract, shape and, ultimately,
control their followers.
You may be thinking that such a small,
radical group (and they are a small group in comparison to the overall
conservative movement) would be marginalized and ineffective. Not a
threat at all. Yet, somehow, in 2004, seven of the Bush White House’s
interns were students from Patrick Henry College. Sound like a small
number? It sure does! Until you consider the total number of interns was
100 and they can be picked from any of the thousands of colleges in the
country. Also consider that Patrick Henry College accepts less than 100
students per year and specifically caters to homeschooled evangelicals.
Suddenly, seven percent seems to be a remarkably high number for a
college you’ve never heard of with such an incredibly small student
body. Just to make you more uneasy, over twenty conservative Congressmen
have had one or more Patrick Henry interns on their staff. And here’s
the icing on the spooky cake: Patrick Henry College was only founded in
2000! So many interns attached to high powered conservatives is quite
the achievement in so short a time.
In the same vein, caucuses are
flooded with the furthest of the Far Right Wing ideologues. This forces
would-be Republican candidates to veer wildly to the Right, usually on
social issues, in order to even be nominated. This, in turn, drags the
entire GOP to the right, not always willingly. We’ve seen a sharply
accelerated version of this with the Tea Party but Dominionists have
been at it much longer. You may recall the days when Jerry Falwell and
his so-called “Moral Majority” exerted a tremendous amount of influence
despite being, in reality, a small, widely dispersed group that merely
made a lot of noise.
This is how a small, but highly organized and
extremely well-funded, group of fringe radicals can control the entire
process. Put the right pressure on the right spot at the right time and
you elect Congressmen and women who do not believe in science and
wholeheartedly support turning the country into one nation under a very
specific God.
This concludes our short introduction to the concept of
Christian Dominionism. Next we will examine how they capture and hold
their followers in my next pack of filthy liberal lies: The March of
Christian Dominionism 2: Where Did It Come From and How Does It Work? Or
“It’s NOT a cult! My beloved leader and all of his followers tell me
so!”
2012-02-29 "The March of Christian Dominionism 2: Where Did It Come From
and How Does It Work?" by Justin "Filthy Liberal Scum" Rosario [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/02/29/the-cult-of-christian-dominionism-or-its-not-a-cult-my-beloved-leader-and-all-of-his-followers-tell-me-so/]:
Or “It’s NOT a cult! My beloved leader and all of his followers tell me so!”
Now
that you’ve read “The March of Christian Dominionism 1″ and have a
basic understanding of what Christian Dominionism is, let’s take a look
at its history and methodology.
Dominionism is an offshoot of
Christian Reconstruction, a radical philosophy made famous by R.J.
Rushdoony early last century. Reconstruction calls for the replacement
of man’s law with Biblical law with all that it entails. Rushdoony was a
great believer in the death penalty for blasphemy (such as my poor,
hypothetical rape victim from the first piece of this series),
homosexuality, infidelity and other transgressions that would make an al
Qaeda fanatic feel right at home. He popularized the concept that
America was originally a Christian nation founded explicitly on
Judeo-Christian principles and that we have strayed from that original,
righteous path. Hence, the needed “reconstruction” of America.
Reconstructionism
(and, by extension, Dominionism) is a postmillennial theology.
Postmillennialists believe that the way must be paved for the return of
Christ by building the Kingdom on Earth, here and now. By way of
comparison, Premillennialists believe that Christ will return and take
the faithful up into heaven, regardless of the state of the world or
even believe that the worse things are, the sooner he will return (this
does not lend itself well to a political philosophy of making the world a
better place). Postmillennialists view this as a somewhat lazy way to
get into heaven and believe they are mandated, by God, to take
possession of the Earth and implement Biblical law in order to fulfill
the prophecy of the end times. This seems particularly odd to me since
being successful in this endeavor SHOULD mean that the Earth is a
paradise (according to a very narrow and disturbing worldview). Where,
then, does Armageddon fit in? God looks down, sees the world being run
according his rules just the way he likes it and says, “Good job! Now
I’m going to destroy it!”? But then, I’m just an ignorant atheist, so
who cares what I think?
Moving forward from Rushdoony to the 1960s,
Francis Schaeffer picked up the torch. While not a theocrat in the same
way Rushdoony and Dominionists are, Schaeffer was very much invested in
the “America as Christian nation” concept even as he shied away from
equating faith with patriotism. It was fairly clear to him (as it is to
liberals) that attaching one to the other denigrates both. He was,
however, one of first evangelicals to make a concerted assault on
legalized abortion. He set the stage for the Dominionists’ take on
secular law: “It is time we consciously realize that when any office
commands what is contrary to God’s Law it abrogates its authority” Sound
familiar? It’s a religious version of “nullification” in which the law
can be ignored but only when it was written by a Democrat.
As the
movement solidified into a cohesive philosophy, Reconstructionist found
that Premillennialists were beginning to embrace the idea of dominionism
(obviously for different reasons but still…) and so they began to work
together. This partnership was formalized with the establishment of the
Coalition on Revival (COR). Formed in 1984, COR spent two years working
out a literal blueprint of how life is to be lived under proper
Christian guidance [
http://65.175.91.69/Reformation_net/default.htm].
Think of it as a Christian version of Sharia law (and that is exactly
what it is). It dictates rules for law, government, education, science
(no evolution, of course and Noah’s Flood was real), family – even rules
for helping the poor and disabled.
Over the following years a number
of “schools” have been set up to teach this singular worldview, and how
to hide it from those who might recognize it for the extremism that it
is. It’s not just a way to live; it teaches one how to think. Seminars
are regularly held for activists to learn the proper way to disseminate
these teachings among future political leaders to great effect. Tom
Delay stood up before a crowd attending a “Worldview Weekend” in 2003
and said the following: “Only Christianity offers a comprehensive
worldview that covers all areas of life and thought, every aspect of
creation. Only Christianity offers a way to live in response to the
realities that we find in this world. Only Christianity.” These are the
people that are infesting and corrupting the GOP.
This is a bare
bones history of the movement; there are many more important figures in
the rise of the Dominionist movement such as Tim Lahaye, author of the
fantastically popular and seriously disturbing Left Behind series.
Lahaye is also a founding member of the highly secretive Council for
National Policy, an organization that I only recommend you read up on if
you don’t mind losing sleep for a few weeks. Or months. Another leading
figure in the movement is widely cited “historian” David Barton. David
Barton is a favorite of Glenn Beck’s and a frequent guest on Fox which,
frankly, should tell you everything you need to know about his
credentials. I strongly encourage you to read more about this troubling
philosophy. Chris Hedges’ American Fascists and Michelle Goldberg’s
Kingdom Coming are an excellent start. Have some antacid on hand. You’ve
been duly warned.
Fear and Anger lead to the Dark Side of Religion -
Despite
being ostensibly “Christian,” Dominionists act more like a cult then a
church. I know there are some irreligious people out there snickering
that “all religions are a cult.” Stop that!! Don’t make the mistake of
lumping Dominionists in with regular church-goers. They are radically
different. They prey (pun very much intended) upon those who have little
to lose or are lacking in a strong sense of self or have simply fallen
into despair.
Just like a “traditional” cult, these “churches” teach
their followers how to gain the trust of others by forging a bond
(sometimes real, sometimes false) over a shared tragedy or hardship.
This trust is then used to pull the mark into the social circle of the
church. As time passes, church activities, picnics, concerts, meetings,
etc. become all consuming. Coincidentally (but not really), previous
social contacts are severed and atrophy. This is how a cult isolates the
convert.
Once the isolation sets in, demands are made of the
convert: You must stop listening to rock ‘n’ roll. No, you mustn’t read
Stephen King’s books. Yes, you can go to the movies but only those that
are church sanctioned, other films are degenerate. Sure, you can go to
your friends’ wedding but your friend isn’t “saved” like we are and that
would disappoint us. You don’t want to disappoint us do you? We’re your
family! You mustn’t EVER disappoint your family!
It’s a bit more
complicated than this but you get the gist. The convert is separated
from friends and relatives. Perhaps not physically but certainly
emotionally. This creates a psychological dependence while providing a
constant threat of being expelled from the new “family.” For the kind of
people that are susceptible to this kind of manipulation, expulsion
from what they consider a safe harbor from the cold harshness of the
real world is tantamount to a death sentence. In reality, it’s nowhere
nearly that terrible but you wouldn’t know it from the blind obedience
such a threat instills in these poor bastards.
But fear of expulsion
only takes you so far. In order to form a cohesive group that will think
and act as one (specifically, by following orders without question)
there must be an external pressure. For Christian Dominionists, this
pressure takes the form of a vast conspiracy arrayed against them.
Stop
me if this sounds familiar: “Homosexuals are destroying this country!
Radical, Godless liberals are assaulting Christianity! If we don’t stop
these Socialists they will round you up and put you into camps just like
the Nazis!” If you need more of this, just turn on Fox, go to a Tea
Party rally or listen to AM talk radio. It will become very clear, very
quickly, that to the Right, there is a literal war going on and the Left
is, literally, trying to destroy them, the country and everything that
is good and decent in the world.
We have met the enemy and they are completely made up.
This
siege mentality is incredibly dangerous to democracy. The threat of
invasion or attack can weaken the knees of even the staunchest Liberal
and the need for revenge can be all-consuming. One needs to look no
further than the months and years after 9/11. In response to this attack
we curtailed our civil liberties, decimated the Constitution, quashed
legal (and perfectly legitimate) dissention, invaded two countries,
pissed away our moral high ground, angered the entire planet… the list
goes on and on and on. All in response to the threat of a few hundred or
thousand religious fanatics hiding in caves (and one very comfortable
compound but he’s dead, so back to just the caves again). If we were
willing to go that far to counter a threat from that small of a group,
how far do you think Dominionists can get their followers to go to
combat the shadowy forces of a vast secular, gay conspiracy?
While
fear binds them together, anger is the force that drives them. A
constant thread of violence and warfare runs throughout the movement.
They are not just Christians but “Christian Soldiers” in battle against
Satan and his minions, Liberals. These “soldiers” are inundated with
images of the Apocalypse and how the sinners will be destroyed even as
they themselves are saved from the horrors to be unleashed. Anyone that
opposes the “will of God” is an enemy. Suspiciously, the “will of God”
is strikingly similar to the will of the Right Wing and, even more
suspiciously, extremely dissimilar to what the Bible actually says.
But
that doesn’t matter. Dominionists MUST have an enemy to focus on to
motivate the troops. For the moment, it’s homosexuals, abortion and
Sharia law. In 2004, there was a massive effort by the Religious Right
to paint gay marriage as THE defining issue of the election and it
worked. During a time of war and an economic downturn, millions of
conservative voters were somehow convinced that the terrible threat of
gay marriage was far more important than the bungling job Bush and the
Republican Congress were doing. Where was this idea planted? Christian
Dominionist churches (as well as plenty of other, non-Dominionist but
still conservative ones).
This may sound like a big old conspiracy
but what would you call it when pastors from all over the country have a
monthly teleconference to discuss strategies and issues of a decidedly
political nature? Not sure? Ask Tony Perkins and his Family Research
Council. They’re one of many Religious Right Wing groups that organize
churches nationwide and essentially hand them marching orders. The
politicization of houses of worship is a deeply disturbing trend. It is
in these sanctuaries that people are most vulnerable and the most easily
swayed. Millions are organized to support whatever agenda a select few
at the top have crafted. The irony that the Gospels of Jesus are used to
rally the unwitting faithful to oppose aid to the sick and the poor and
to further the goal of Dominionism is lost only on these abused
worshipers. Despite the restrictions supposedly placed on churches by
the IRS, these bastions of Right Wing politics preach a very specific
message of how the congregation should vote. Their growing numbers and
fervor make them a powerful voice in politics.
And Bush’s “Faith Based Initiative” gave these groups quite the boost.
Imagine
a lobbying group that had unrestricted access to the President and his
staff, played a key role in crafting policy, and received billions of
taxpayers’ dollars to further their work of undermining the framework of
democracy. Your blood would boil if just a regular lobbying group, say
Big Oil, engaged in such borderline illegal activities. Now imagine that
it was a group that is expressly separated by the very Constitution the
President is sworn to uphold from intermingling too closely with the
government. That was life under the Bush administration and the damage
continues to unfold today.
Supposedly, the Faith Based Initiative was
to provide billions to religious organizations in order to help the
homeless and hungry. In reality, it funneled all of that taxpayer money
to sympathetic churches that were then empowered to spread the Good Word
about religious conservatism. How do we know this? Because one of the
more vocal critics of this scheme was the late Jerry Falwell. Oddly
enough, Falwell seemed to be one of the few conservatives aware of the
fact that the Presidency might not always BE occupied by a Dominionist.
What happens when a centrist or, God forbid, an actual liberal takes
office? That money won’t go to just good and decent Christian churches,
but might end up in the hands of Jews and Muslims! This very real
concern (Obama did exactly this when he took office) gives the lie to
the philanthropic conceit of the original program. If the true goal is
to feed the hungry and shelter the homeless, who cares what religion
takes up the task? But, of course, that was never the intent. The Bush
Administration, (deeply steeped in Dominionism or did you think their
Crusade against Islam was a coincidence?), abused its power to erode the
barriers between Church and State and fatten the purse of the
Dominionist movement at the same time.
Since then, Dominionists have
lost their hold on the White House, so they have turned their focus
towards Congress and the State legislatures. Now, conservatives are
ANGRY! Republicans are OUTRAGED! The supposedly “grassroots” Tea Party
is FURIOUS! Why? GAY MARRIAGE and ABORTION and SHARIA LAW!!! Just as in
2004, a flailing economy and two wars (and two half-wars) just aren’t as
important as stopping these supposed engines of social destruction.
Yes, these issues took a back seat to the economy for the 2010 elections
but what did the newly triumphant GOP House majority tackle once it
took power? Did they immediately focus on the economy and create
millions of jobs? No. They attacked gay and reproductive rights and held
hearings on encroaching Sharia.
the Religious Right has lapped it
up. Their anger at these sinful activities is undiminished. Gays want to
make their children into sex slaves. Abortionists want to wipe out
black people. Never mind that 60 years ago, these were the same people
declaring that mixed race marriages were the devil’s work, now THEY are
the defenders of the black race against the depredations of secular
liberals. Consistency is not a strong point for Dominionists and it
doesn’t need to be. As long as they keep their flock angry and afraid,
there is no limit to the lies they can sell. A prime example of this is,
again, none other than Jerry Falwell who, during the Civil Rights
movement, often championed the cause of George “segregation now,
segregation tomorrow and segregation forever” Wallace. After 1970, when
blatant racism became a liability, Falwell dropped his public bigotry.
Instead of standing up and announcing his “change of heart”, however
Falwell quietly had copies of his old speeches destroyed. He moved
forward as if he had never supported the Segregation movement. Down the
memory hole it went and the Religious Right played right along with the
lie.
Fear and Anger, the very core of the Dominionism movement. Is it
any wonder they are impossible to engage in rational debate or
compromise? We’ll look at this parallel world where science is bad,
women are obedient, the Founding Fathers were all Christian and home is
where the school is in my next frothing liberal lament: The March of
Christian Dominionism 3: How Christian Dominionism Combats Reality or
“Take your stinking evolution off my kids you damn, dirty liberal!”
2012-03-05 "The March of Christian Dominionism 3: How Christian Dominionists Combat Reality"
by Justin "Filthy Liberal Scum" Rosario [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/03/05/the-march-of-christian-dominionism-3-how-christian-dominionists-combat-reality/]:
Or “Take your stinking evolution off my kids you damn, dirty liberal!”
So
how is the Christian Dominionist movement different than the regular
old Religious Right? On the surface they seem pretty much identical:
both pursue social politics, both proclaim that family values are of
prime importance, both encourage divisive bigotry of one form or another
and both raise millions by appealing to the baser instincts of their
followers. It is not easy to discern where they separate because
Dominionists are not very vocal about their deeper plans for the country
with outsiders.
The Religious Right is many things, but they do not
actively work towards the destruction and replacement of the government
with a Theocracy. Of course, this is exactly what Christian Dominionists
want and the Religious Right is complicit in their drive to obtain it.
These last two sentences might seem to be actively at odds with one
another. They are not. The Religious Right is more than willing to make
nice with groups they would ordinarily despise to further their agenda.
One need look no further than the pro-Israel stance of the GOP for
evidence of this. The vigor with which the Right defends Israel is a
wonder to behold until you realize that the whole point of supporting
Israel is so that the Israelis can rebuild the temple of Solomon and
fulfill one of the key requirements of the end time prophecies. By the
way, these prophecies also clearly state that most of the Jewish race
will be exterminated at that time. I’m guessing the Religious Right
doesn’t discuss that part too much with the Israelis.
In any event,
Christian Dominionism is very much like the dreaded threat of “creeping
Sharia” that has so many on the Right supposedly scared silly. A way of
life that is antithetical to a secular democracy is slowly being enacted
throughout the country. We shouldn’t even give a second glance to the
“threat” of Sharia in this country when a much clearer and more present
danger is among us. This is not to say that there aren’t people who
would love to see Sharia law implemented in the United States. There
certainly are. They simply don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of
making it happen. Even in the dreaded Dearborn, Michigan. These
religious fanatics do, however, make an excellent boogeyman for all
manner of unscrupulous people. To the Dominionist, it is a way of
forcing people to make a false “choice”: Will you allow Sharia to
overrun the country or will you embrace God’s Law like all good
Christians do?
This is, of course, ridiculous. One simply needs only
embrace the Constitution to ward off the eeeeevils of Sharia. That
doesn’t work well for Christian Dominionists for reasons that should be
self-evident at this point. The Constitution explicitly states that
religion and government are not to be mixed, and so it has become a
Crusade among Dominionists to rewrite history. This is, perhaps, the
single most dangerous aspect of their agenda, the wholesale erasure and
replacement of reality and history with a more, shall we say, divine
interpretation.
There are a number of reasons history and, to an
almost equal extent, science are a threat to the “Christian” future.
History tells us who we are and where we came from. George Orwell was
entirely too aware of the need tyrants have to control over this
information. In his seminal work, “1984,” Orwell called the apparatus
put in place to accomplish this task the “Ministry of Truth.” They were
in charge of making sure “history” reflected whatever current day agenda
was in effect. With a push of a button, a war that had been raging for
years with one enemy becomes a war that had been raging for all that
same time with a completely different one. The State must be infallible.
In
the same fashion, after centuries of understanding the First Amendment,
specifically the Establishment Clause, of the Constitution in a very
specific manner based on the words and intent of the founding Fathers,
there are now questions. Despite numerous examples of most of the
Fathers being Deists (not ascribing to a particular organized religion
or even, necessarily, a supernatural force) or even actively derisive of
Christianity, Dominionists insist that not only was the country founded
on Judeo-Christian principles but that the Constitution is expressly a
religious document despite it not containing a single word to that
effect.
Once sufficient doubt is cast upon the secular nature of our
country’s founding document, everything and anything becomes malleable.
Please note that I use the word “sufficient” instead of “legitimate.”
“Legitimate” would mean that there is a real debate over the facts.
There is not. We have handwritten letters that explicitly state the
original intent (there’s a reason Texas is trying to remove Jefferson
from history text books) and they leave no room for doubt about their
intent towards government and religion. But this is beside the point.
Dominionists are more than happy to tell their flock whatever they want,
secure in the knowledge that they will not question. To question is to
lack faith. Ignorance is strength.
This is the genius of politicized
religion. Once a person is a true “believer,” regardless of whether they
actually believe or are too terrified of expulsion to admit they do
not, they will consequently accept any lie they are fed. This serves the
dual purpose of making any claim about how the country should be run
seem perfectly normal and also of further isolating the flock: Of course
the United States should be run according to Biblical law, the
Constitution was divinely inspired, and who could possibly doubt that?
Anyone that says otherwise is a liar and probably an atheist Communist
Marxist unpatriotic traitor. It doesn’t matter how much evidence they
provide or how solid their argument. They MUST be lying.
This
artificial schizophrenia extends to the realm of science as well. I say
“artificial schizophrenia” because, in the phantasmagorical world of the
Dominionist, everyday life is completely divorced from empirical
reality. Miracles and prayer will solve all problems and if your
particular problem is not solved in this way, the fault lies with your
lack of faith. Again, some of the less religiously inclined are
snickering that all religious people think this way. Don’t make me hit
you with a rolled up newspaper! Those thoroughly ensnared in the corrupt
mythology of Dominionism have no choice but to believe that every
aspect of their life is being directly controlled. Cause and effect are
as illusory as free will.
Now is when the massive assaults on science
and education come into play. I’ve written about this before as well
(Why do conservatives hate science so much? Or “How I learned not to
learn and trust my beer gut instead” [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/questions/“why-do-conservatives-hate-science-so-much”-or-“how-i-learned-not-to-learn-and-trust-my-beer-gut-instead-”/])
but it bears a re-examination in the light of Dominionism. Science is
the natural enemy of Fundamentalism and, by extension, Dominionism.
Science encourages critical thinking and free inquiry, concepts that are
pure anathema to a totalitarian religious philosophy. Science also
reduces mankind from a divine creature, put on the earth to rule, to a
not exactly random result of natural processes. We’re still the top of
the food chain but only due to our unique and innate intellect, not
because we were “meant” to be.
Without the divine origins of man,
Dominionism loses much of its self-granted authority. If the Bible is
not literally true, then religion becomes merely a guide for living a
moral life and not the source of all morality and knowledge as
Dominionists claim. To combat this, there has been a war waged against
science in general and public education in specific for decades.
As
I’ve said before, an uneducated population is far easier to manipulate
and control. It’s hard to think of how to make the world a better place
when you don’t know HOW to think. When you’ve been raised to believe
that there is ALWAYS a Biblical answer to every question, it becomes so
easy to dismiss actual experts and only listen to the side that says
what you want to hear. It doesn’t matter that the religious argument can
provide no solid evidence or facts, you don’t know how to judge for
yourself anyway. This is the point of the Right Wing’s war on education
and it’s all about defunding schools and colleges.
The Right wants to
divert tax dollars to for-profit charter schools that have not proven
to be any more effective than public schools (and that are far less
accountable). Not only does this starve public schools of vital funds,
but it enables the Right to complain how terrible public education is.
It’s an awesome racket: make schools dysfunctional by underpaying
teachers and ensuring the schools are run down and then use this
dysfunction as proof that public education is unworkable.
The assault
on colleges is different. The goal here is to raise tuitions so high
that the choice is either to not go at all or spend the next 20 years
paying off loans. Why do you think Republicans howled in pain when Obama
did away with subsidized loans and cut out the extremely unnecessary
middle man? It was a one-two punch for the Right. Not only did banks
lose billions in revenue they did nothing to earn, it made school loans
less painful for those who need it the most. Notice that this was not
important enough to make any real news. Most of you reading this didn’t
even know it was part of the Health Care Reform package. Obama tacked it
on so the GOP couldn’t block it. Yet, you know all about Anthony
Weiner’s weiner. This should tell you something about the state of the
country.
So, to wit: make public schools function as poorly as
possible, especially in low income areas. Make college too expensive for
most to obtain a degree and then use the resulting failure to justify
further cuts and convince people that home schooling is the best option.
When you break the system of public education, the public will look
elsewhere to educate their children and home schooling is the “answer.”
Home
schooling is a rapidly expanding movement among the Religious Right.
And it is a huge part of their war on science and history. Over one
million children are currently being educated outside of the public
school system; many of them being indoctrinated into the world of
religious fanaticism. Do I sound alarmist? How does an entire generation
raised to believe “God said it. I believe it. That settles it” sound to
you? Does that sound like a group of people capable of objectively
assessing the challenges facing the country and the world? Do you think
they will be capable of overcoming their conditioning to embrace any
solution that is not fully “Christian?” Neither do I.
This kind of
parallel education has reached frightening heights as (former)
candidates like Michele Bachmann, and
maybe-maybe-not-but-who-can-really-tell-if-she’s-running Sarah Palin
spit out gems like ““The very founders that wrote those documents worked
tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States,” and “He who
warned uh, the British that they weren’t gonna be takin’ away our arms,
uh by ringing those bells…” on a regular basis. Mike Huckabee, another
powerful voice in conservative politics even has his own cartoon series
for home schooled children. In it, a group of plucky time travelling
kids can be found saying “What we see and hear isn’t always the same as
what we read in books or see on TV. So what? We know the truth and
that’s good enough for us!”
God said it. I believe it. That settles it!
So
we have an “army” of Christian Soldiers whose main weapons will be pure
ignorance, rigid, uncritical thought and blind obedience. Dominionists
have built an entire culture that is separated from the rest of the
world by a shield of dogma. They know how to insinuate themselves into
the government at some of the highest positions and they know how to
influence elections to their benefit. They have massive financial
backing from both their followers as well as corporations that may not
be interested in Dominionists’ social agenda but are very supportive of
their economic goals.
But how will you know if a particular policy
from the GOP is simple conservative greed or something darker and more
sinister? How will you recognize the Dominionist agenda? That’s the
question I will attempt to answer in last part of this series of liberal
slander: How Dominionists are trying to undermine our country Or “So
THAT’S why the GOP’s been doing that!!”
2012-03-11 "The March of Christian Dominionism 4: How Dominionists Are Trying To Undermine Our Country"
by Justin "Filthy Liberal Scum" Rosario [
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/03/11/the-march-of-christian-dominionism-4-how-dominionists-are-trying-to-undermine-our-country/]:
Or “So THAT’S why the GOP has been doing that!!”
We
know what Christian Dominionism is (if you don’t, go back and read
parts one, two and three. No skipping!). We know what they want and we
know why they want it. Now the question becomes: how are they doing it
and what are the signs of their influence in politics?
Again, we find
there to be some overlap between your standard Right Wing,
anti-government rhetoric and the goals of Christian Dominionists. But
some of it is purely a creature of religious zealotry.
There are many
fronts to the Dominionist attack on our way of life; one of them is the
ongoing assault on the social safety nets that have been in place for
decades. Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare are under constant
threat of being extinguished so we’ll start there:
Social Security:
Technically, the Right hates Social Security because it’s “Big
Government” and costs too much money. That is, of course, garbage. The
amount of money and resources consumed by our bloated military dwarfs SS
but that’s never an issue. No. The “problem” with Social Security is
that it represents the country pulling together (the “social”) to ensure
that no one is left to die in poverty and hunger (the “security”). This
reliance on others goes against the Right’s creed of “personal
responsibility” which is code for “everyone for themselves.”
The
Dominionists, however, have a slightly different take on SS. This
collective pooling of resources for the betterment of all means that
fewer people have to turn to them for their needs. Thus, Social Security
deprives religious organizations of power in the form of less desperate
people. Privatization is a good way to end it (and make Wall St. untold
billions in profit in the process) but for Dominionists, the goal is
simply to make it go away altogether.
Medicare and Medicaid: The
objection to these stunningly popular and useful programs is similar to
the objections against Social Security but the attack against them is
far more insidious.
Instead of dismantling the entire program the
goal is vouchers. But why vouchers? The GOP seems to be quite taken with
them. They want them for Medicare, Medicaid and schools. This is a
clear sign of Dominionist influence on the GOP because vouchers are an
end run around the Establishment clause of the First Amendment.
The
Establishment Clause forbids government money to be used to by an
organization to evangelize as part of the disbursement of those funds.
In other words, if you take government money to feed the hungry, you
cannot promote your religion while doing so. Also, under no
circumstances, can you withhold services based on your religious
beliefs. So if the Westboro Baptist Church took government money to
shelter the homeless, they could not turn away a homosexual.
Vouchers,
on the other hand, eliminate this prickly proselytization problem. The
legal argument goes like this: Since the money is not coming directly
from the government, all bets are off. By giving the voucher to the
“consumer,” the choice of where to spend that money is solely up to
them. The Establishment Clause does not apply. In this scenario, a
church can turn away any “undesirables” while still providing services.
In addition, they can also pressure the sick, the elderly and the
desperate to embrace their particular worldview. These groups are
already susceptible to manipulation and vouchers leave them all the more
vulnerable to the depredations of Dominionists.
School vouchers are
even more easily abused as the schools will be free to teach Creationism
and the Christian Dominionist worldview. Your tax dollars ALREADY get
abused this way illegally as many schools corrupt the regular curriculum
with religion until someone reports it. Imagine how widespread it would
be if it was legal to teach our children that the world is only 6000
years old?
Grants work the same way. The government gives money to an
umbrella organization, say, the Salvation Army, (a group that will no
longer employee homosexuals) due to their “charity” work, and the
organization disperses the money to smaller groups. Those groups are now
free of the Establishment Clause to push their religious agenda, all
the while using tax payer dollars.
When you hear the word “voucher”
or “grant” in any discussion of entitlements or schools, what you are
really witnessing is the Religious Right attempting to bypass the
Constitution. If you take away one thing from this article, let it be
that.
But the Dominionists’ agenda goes far beyond just undermining
the social safety net or subverting it for their own purposes.
Dominionists are hard at work undermining the very concept of America as
a democracy.
Tax cuts & deregulation: Totalitarian regimes exist
with an extreme concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a
very select few. Christian Dominionism is no different. To the
Dominionist, there can be no such thing as democracy. The masses cannot
be allowed self-rule; only those “chosen” by God (i.e., the Aristocracy)
are worthy enough to divine “His” intent.
And exactly what is “His”
intent? Why, that the rich should get richer, of course! “God” hates
taxes on the wealthy and massive corporationd. This is why Big Business
so readily gets into bed with Dominionists. They are very aware of the
desire of Dominionism to concentrate all the wealth and power of the
United States at the top of the economic food chain. In the
schizophrenic world of the Dominionist, pollution is no big deal and
natural resources are self-replenishing, even oil. Any toxins leaked
into the environment are no difficulty to the faithful because “God”
smiles upon those engines of enterprise, corporations. Therefore,
government regulation is not just unnecessary; it’s against the will of
“God.” Of course, the fact that deregulation only benefits an extremely
small group of people while causing untold misery for the rest is just a
coincidence and is probably punishment for our blasphemous ways.
When
you hear a religious leader proclaiming that the government is seeking
to punish others through taxes and regulation, that’s a Dominionist
speaking.
Have you ever wondered why it is that Republicans, who seem
to utterly despise the Government, seek to be in charge of it by any
immoral, unethical and borderline illegal means necessary? Have you
noticed how, when they ARE in charge, they do everything they claim to
be against? Run up deficits. Explode the national debt. Massively expand
government. And then complain about all of those things when a Democrat
takes the White house? There’s a very clear pattern of deliberate
sabotage of the country by the Right. Part of it is simple cronyism.
When your political philosophy is “less regulation” you do not put an
unfriendly expert in charge of the regulatory agency of a particular
industry, you put in an industry friend who will do what you want;
Specifically, not regulate. Later, when the corruption is exposed and
the damage is done, for instance, FEMA leaving thousands stranded for
days in a football stadium after a hurricane, you can point to the utter
failure and proudly state that “Government IS the problem!” This is,
essentially, the same tactic used against public schools. Break the
system, use the resulting failure as proof that the system doesn’t work,
rinse, repeat until you can privatize everything.
Part of it may be
cronyism, but the main part objective is to tarnish the concept “of the
people, by the people, for the people.”
When the Right is in control
of the country they do everything they can to make the government look
bad. When they’re in the minority, the chant of “Government is bad” is
nonstop. No expense is spared, no boundary is left uncrossed, no taboo
is considered too great in their quest to convince the populace that
their Government is the worst thing to ever happen to them. But what’s
the endgame? For a Dominionist, the goal is not to eradicate Government
outright but to first subvert it and infect it with religious extremism.
As the rot of extremism permeates and becomes the norm, it will become
easier and easier to erect the Theocracy that is the ultimate goal.
When
you hear a politician demand a smaller government and more “freedom”
while simultaneously demanding that the government legislate who you can
marry, what kind of sex you can have, who you can have sex with and
what kinds of services your doctor can offer, they are not describing
“freedom” as you and I understand it. They are describing “freedom” from
sin and vice, or, in other words, the “freedom” to not be tempted by
supposedly immoral behavior by making that behavior illegal. The louder
the call for “freedom” while the greater the demand that restrictions be
placed on your personal life, the clearer it is that a Dominionist is
speaking.
The final aspect of Dominionist behavior that we will be
taking a look at is the misogyny inherent in the movement. It’s never
been more apparent that the Religious Right has some serious issues with
women. The Religious Right is attacking Planned Parenthood, which
provides affordable health care to millions of women across the country.
They consistently blame the victim in cases of rape (although this is
not strictly a Right Wing phenomena, they are the most vocal about it).
They have started to speak, openly, about how women should not be
allowed to vote because they are “too emotional”. This is 1950’s code
for “too stupid.” The Religious Right wants to ban all contraception,
taking away all reproductive options for women. Including the pill. Some
have even gone so far as to enact laws that would place women that
miscarry under criminal suspicion unless they can prove it was a natural
occurrence. Women are already being held against their will if they so
much as hint that they want to terminate a pregnancy.
The flood of
anti-woman sentiment that has spilled across the country is
unprecedented in my life time. It also makes no sense unless you look at
it from a religious angle. Women have proven themselves just as capable
as men in the workplace, in politics, in the military and in the
classroom. Despite the setbacks of Paris Hilton and the Kardashians,
women have easily earned a seat at the table and have made no small
contribution to the country.
Yet they are under attack. Why?
It’s
about control. Dominionism is always about control and in Extremist
Chistianity, just as in Extremist Islam, the woman MUST submit to the
man. It’s the “natural order” of things. A woman must dress modestly. A
woman must defer to a man’s judgment. A woman should remain in the home,
raising the children. To do otherwise is to challenge the
male-dominated establishment.
Partly, the need to exert authority
over women stems from the overwhelming insecurities of the Dominionist
movement. Remember, the entire movement is built on the concept that
they are under attack from all sides by enemies who would destroy them
in a heartbeat. The role they have cast for themselves is one of
perpetual victimhood and powerlessness. This is not a sustainable role
for a man to be in that is engulfed by the machismo paradigm[i]. You
know what I’m talking about: I am a man! Master of my castle! I wear the
pants in my family! I am the provider! Grrrr! Arrrggg! Blah, blah,
blah.
How could such a walking stereotype NOT be threatened by a
strong woman? Or even a mildly assertive one? And so, these manly men of
the Christian Dominionist movement lord over (pun much intended)
“their” women and try to reduce them to the cardboard cutout that was
June Cleaver.
To this end, women are denied reproductive rights
wherever and whenever possible under the guise of “protecting the
unborn.” Somehow, though, all contraceptives are evil in the eyes of the
Dominionist, even the ones that prevent fertilization, thus, exposing
the lie of their opposition. A woman that has control over when she gets
pregnant is free to live her life as she pleases. Unthinkable to the
extremist.
Says Janice Crouse, of the anti-choice Concerned Women for America:
“…Radical feminists accurately see abortion as a woman’s ultimate
weapon in the battle to escape the control of men. The issue is of
power, of having the power to call the shots. With abortion as an
option, a woman can escape pregnancy...” (emphasis mine)
Could that be any more clear?
When
you hear a politician rail against abortion mills and the decay of
morals among women, you’re hearing a Dominionist tell you that a woman
must be put in her place.
If this series of articles has done
anything for you, it should have helped you understand just what it is
that is going on in this country and why. There IS a method to the
madness of the GOP. It is not just conservative politics that are
driving us to ruin, but a concerted effort from a group of deeply
disturbed fanatics. Will they succeed in instituting Biblical law? Of
course not, but they will do incalculable damage in the meantime. They
will squander billions of dollars in tax payer money and resources and
ruin the lives of millions with their radical agenda. For that alone,
they need to be understood and stopped.
2011-10-17 "Election-year goals of Christian group questioned" from "Associated Press" newswire
AP writer Alan Scher Zagier contributed to this story.
---
In the 1940s, an argument erupted among a group of American Christians far from the mainstream.
Pentecostals,
the spirit-filled worshippers known mostly for speaking in tongues,
were at a crossroads, divided over the extent of God's modern-day
miracles. If God made apostles and prophets during the New Testament
era, did he still create them today?
Most Pentecostals said no, and went on to build the movement's major denominations.
A
minority disagreed _ and amazingly, their obscure view is now in the
crosshairs of a presidential race. Some critics, fearing these
little-known Christians want to control the U.S. government, suspect
that Republican Rick Perry is their candidate.
The Texas governor
opened the door to the discussion with a prayer rally he hosted in
August, a week before he announced his run for president. Organizers of
the Houston event, such as Lou Engle, leader of The Call prayer
marathons, and Mike Bickle, founder of the International House of Prayer
in Kansas City, had for several years been under the watch of mostly
liberal writers alarmed by the preachers' rhetoric.
The end of the
world is an intense focus of many of the religious leaders involved in
the rally. Engle has said that the tornado that leveled Joplin, Mo.,
last May was evidence of God's judgment on the country over abortion.
Bickle views acceptance of same-sex marriage as a sign of the end times.
These
preachers believe demons have taken hold of specific geographic areas,
including the nation's capital. They also promote a philosophy of public
engagement known as the "seven mountains," which urges Christians to
gain influence in business, government, family, church, education, media
and the arts as a way to spread righteousness and bring about God's
kingdom on earth. The language seems close to dominionism, the belief
that Christians have a God-given mandate to run the world.
Ever
since Perry gave the leaders a broader platform, religion scholars and
activists have been debating whether these church leaders represent a
real threat, an apocalyptic vanguard maneuvering to establish a
Christian government. The task of measuring their influence is
complicated by the preachers' wide range of teaching and practice, and
by the many different expressions of dominionism under various names.
MSNBC's
Rachel Maddow warned that dominionists want to prepare the world for
Jesus' return by "infiltration and taking over politics and government."
Michelle Goldberg, author of "Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian
Nationalism," wrote at The Daily Beast, "We have not seen this sort of
thing at the highest levels of the Republican Party before."
Randall
Stephens, a professor at Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Mass., who
researches Pentecostals and politics, called warnings of a conservative
Christian plot an overreaction. "I think this is a rabbit hole people
fall down and it has a whiff of conspiracy," Stephens said.
Anthea
Butler, who has written extensively about dominionism with author Sarah
Posner on the liberal website ReligionDispatches.org, considers the
outlook troubling and worth examining, but cautioned against overstating
its strength.
"I don't know if `threat' is the right word. I
think `problem' is the better word," said Butler, a religion scholar at
the University of Pennsylvania.
Perry has never said anything that
would directly link him to dominionism. However, he fueled speculation
about his views at the rally by quoting from Joel 2, a Bible book the
preachers favor, which tells of a prayer assembly of spiritual warriors
as the world ends. On stage with the governor was Alice Patterson,
author of "Bridging the Racial and Political Divide: How Godly Politics
Can Transform A Nation," who believes there is a "demonic structure
behind the Democratic Party."
Robert Black, a Perry campaign
spokesman, said the GOP governor is an evangelical who attends Lake
Hills Church in Austin. In a recent appearance at Liberty University,
founded by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell, Perry explained that he had
turned to God in a time of need _ a personal testimony common for
born-again Christians.
"Gov. Perry believes that Americans of all
faiths should be active in dictating the course of our country," Black
wrote in an e-mail. "He supports our republican form of democracy and
trusts the American people to decide who should lead it."
Critics
have also questioned whether Michele Bachmann's religious and political
views have crossed a line into dominionism. In a 2006 appearance in
Minnesota, the year she was first elected to Congress, she prayed, "We
are in the last days" and called separation of church and state "a
myth." In the 1980s, Bachmann was a law student at Oral Roberts
University, a Pentecostal school which emphasized the biblical basis of
U.S. law. However, that approach is shared among a range of conservative
Christians and is not the definitive marker of someone who thinks only
Christians should govern.
Many evangelical leaders are incensed by
the discussion. The allegation that Christians are plotting to build a
theocracy has dogged Christian conservatives since the 1970s and `80s,
when evangelicals stunned both Democrats and Republicans by emerging
from political hibernation to regain their voice in public life.
Chuck
Colson, the Watergate figure and founder of the Prison Fellowship
ministries, said labels such as "dominionist" are epithets meant to
discredit all Christian activists. David French, senior counsel at the
American Center for Law and Justice, founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson,
wrote an article in the National Review with the mocking headline, "I'm a
Dominionist? I had no idea."
However, many religion scholars
argue that some watered-down dominionist principles have long influenced
conservative Christian activists, who hope to shape society according
to a biblical worldview. (A true dominionist not only wants Christians
to shape the world, but also run it.)
Bruce Barron, a Christian
scholar and author of the 1992 book "Heaven on Earth? The Social &
Political Agendas of Dominion Theology," wrote that many early leaders
of the Christian right said they had been influenced by the social
analysis of Rousas John Rushdoony, who believed the nation was in a
moral and cultural crisis and advocated replacing democracy with
biblical law, mostly from the Old Testament. This way of thinking is
known as Christian Reconstructionism.
By the late 1980s, many
evangelical leaders felt that dominionist ideas had gained so much
attention that they could no longer simply dismiss the teaching as
fringe, Barron wrote. Among the critiques was a February 1987 cover
story in Christianity Today, the prominent evangelical magazine founded
by the Rev. Billy Graham, which quoted scholars saying that ignoring the
stream of thinking is no longer an option. "They haven't been taken
seriously enough," one scholar told the magazine.
More recently,
C. Peter Wagner, an expert in church growth, has become a lightning rod
for critics of dominionism, largely because of the extensive research of
Talk2Action.org, a liberal investigative site, and one of its writers,
Rachel Tabachnik.
Wagner is a former professor at Fuller
Theological Seminary, a prominent evangelical school in Pasadena,
Calif., who had noted the rapid spread of independent Pentecostal
churches. In 1974, he dubbed the trend the New Apostolic Reformation,
and eventually became a leader among these churches. He is now
considered an apostle along with his wife Doris, who specializes in
healing.
Wagner sharpened the Pentecostal focus on spiritual
warfare, through books with titles such as, "Breaking Strangleholds in
Your City (Prayer Warriors)." He trains people to use intense direct
prayer and other strategies to fight demonic control of specific cities
or regions. In addition, he promotes the "seven mountains" philosophy of
placing Christians in positions of influence, but insists it is no
stealth plan for a Christian-only government. Wagner said that most of
the church leaders he works with believe that both major parties are
under demonic influence _ not just the Democrats _ although some
individual politicians are "kingdom-minded." Church members are deeply
frustrated about politicians promising to outlaw abortion and address
other social issues, but never fulfilling this pledge, Wagner said.
"There's
nobody that I know _ there may be some fringe people _ who would even
advocate a theocracy," Wagner said in a phone interview from Colorado
Springs, Colo., where his ministries are based. "We honor those who have
other kinds of faith."
Bickle, interviewed in Kansas City, Mo.,
said he knows Wagner but is not affiliated with him. Bickle called the
apostle "a humble guy" who does not know Perry and would not advocate
Christian control of society.
"He's got a team of loosely
connected people - maybe 100 ministries - it's a small number. They are
`quote' telling people to go influence society. But some of their guys
under them are using these hostile terms, like `taking over society,'"
said Bickle, who said he is not a dominionist.
"We want to influence things in our own microscopic way," Bickle said. "I wish we did have influence, but it's so minute."
Mel
Robeck, a specialist in Pentecostalism at Fuller Theological Seminary,
cautioned against concluding too much from the preachers at Perry's
event. Robeck is a minister with the Assemblies of God, one of the
largest Pentecostal groups, which posts a 13-page theological statement
on its website explaining why the denomination does not believe in
contemporary apostles and prophets.
Robeck viewed the prayer rally
as standard GOP outreach to religious conservatives who form the core
of the Republican Party and sees Wagner as repackaging old, marginal
ideas to create a new movement. Days after the Texas governor held the
prayer marathon, the American Family Association, which financed the
event, emailed participants asking for help registering conservative
Christians ahead of the 2012 election.
"To see potential political
leaders courting these people _ what they're really doing is looking
for the votes that they think these folks can deliver," Robeck said. "I
don't know of any politician that can afford to miss any kind of church
vote and they know that church leaders can often influence people."
2011-10-08 "Burning Mormon Scripture? Rick Perry’s “Mormon Problem” Gets Bigger" by B. E. Wilson
[
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2011/10/08/burning-mormon-scripture-rick-perrys-mormon-problem-gets-bigger/]
Beyond
Rick Perry’s high-profile Friday endorsement from Baptist pastor Robert
Jeffress, who openly calls Mormonism a “cult”, Perry has worked closely
with the charismatic evangelical tendency known as the New Apostolic
Reformation, which dominated Perry’s August 6th presidential campaign
launch event, The Response, and whose top leaders advise burning Books
of Mormon [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/9/14/192516/418].
On
Friday, October 7th 2011, Texas Baptist megachurch pastor Robert
Jeffress introduced Rick Perry’s speech at the 2011 Family Research
Council Voter Values Summit and endorsed presidential hopeful Perry (a
key endorsement for Perry’s campaign according to the LA Times.) Perry’s
presidential campaign specifically approved of the choice of Jeffress
to introduce Perry’s speech at the event [
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/65467.html].
On the same day, pastor Jeffress attacked Mormonism, the faith of presidential hopeful Mitt Romney [
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/07/blunt-talk-about-mormonism-at-the-values-voter-summit/?hp%E2%80%9D].
As Jeffress stated in an interview with American Family Association
spokesperson Bryan Fischer, “We need to understand, it [Mormonism] is
not Christianity, it is not a branch of Christianity, it is a cult”.
The
Perry campaign, now in damage control mode, has responded with a
statement that “The governor does not believe Mormonism is a cult.” But
Perry’s ties to overtly anti-Mormon tendencies include his alliance with
the rapidly growing movement on the charismatic evangelical right known
as the New Apostolic Reformation, whose leading figure C. Peter Wagner
has also labeled Mormonism a cult and whose top leaders (Wagner
included) advise burning books of Mormon.
On September 28th, 2009,
as described in an August 3, 2011 story in the Texas Observer, members
of C. Peter Wagner’s New Apostolic Reformation blessed Governor Perry,
in a private ceremony at the governor’s office in the Texas State House.
On August 6th 2011, standing alongside Wagner apostle Alice Patterson
(who has endorsed a book attacking Martin Luther King, Jr. [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/10/5/185950/939/]),
Rick Perry addressed (link to video of full Perry speech) tens of
thousands assembled at Houston’s Reliant Stadium for The Response.
Within
C. Peter Wagner’s New Apostolic Reformation, whose apostles
overwhelmingly dominated Rick Perry’s August 6th, 2011 The Response
prayer rally that served as Perry’s de facto presidential campaign
launch event [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/9/16/144354/102/],
Mormonism is not only branded a cult; it is also doctrine within
Wagner’s branch of the NAR movement that Books of Mormon, which
according to Wagner “bring honor to the spirits of darkness”, should be
doused with gasoline and burned.
There is no question as to the facts; repeatedly in their in-print books [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/9/14/192516/418],
Wagner and his top NAR movement leaders (including Cindy Jacobs, Ed
Silvoso and Chuck Pierce) have detailed the need for believers to burn,
smash, flush down toilets or otherwise destroy allegedly evil and
idolatrous objects including Books of Mormon, statues of Catholic saints
and rosary beads, and native art, such as ceremonial masks and totem
poles.
Lists of items slated for destruction by Wagner’s movement
include those associated with Mormonism, Islam, Jehovah’s Witnesses,
Hinduism, eastern religions, Christian Science, native religions, and
Baha’i. The movement also targets, for destruction, objects associated
with the Catholic faith including statues of Catholic saints,
crucifixes, and rosary beads.
At an October 2008 movement
gathering in Argentina, top NAR apostle and prophet Cindy Jacobs told
(link to video of Jacobs at event [
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DakDS_7Z3bM#t=54s]) her audience at the conference, held by Peter Wagner’s close NAR movement Ed Silvoso,
“Pastors,
sanctify your people! You go and you tell ‘em, if you have any idols in
their homes we’re gonna to burn ‘em! If you have any witchcraft items
in your homes, you bring ‘em Sunday and we’re gonna burn ‘em! We’re not
gonna have witchcraft in this church!”
[below:
screenshot from page 38 of C. Peter Wagner's book Hard-Core Idolatry:
Facing The Facts (1999, Wagner Institute of Practical Ministry), which
details objects to be burned]
[video,
below: following 1:42 in this video, from a lecture C. Peter Wagner
gave for his Wagner Leadership Institute course AP825, on the New
Apostolic Reformation, Wagner describes Mormonism as a "cult" and
"cultic".]
In
the video above, while describing the sector of Christianity from which
the NAR has emerged, Wagner shows a chart of world Christianity as
defined in the World Christian Encyclopedia, by David Barrett. Wagner
states,
“You have the Protestant and this is sometime called
evangelical as well. This is where the Pentecostals and the Assemblies
of God would be in one of David Barrett’s mega-blocks. And then you have
the marginal Christians, which I tend to leave out because this is the
Jehovah’s witnesses and the Mormons and that kind of cult, what we think
is cultic, but he includes it in the whole thing.”
For more
information and perspectives on the New Apostolic Reformation, see two
recent full length segments of Terry Gross’ Fresh Air NPR show (1 [
http://www.npr.org/2011/08/24/139781021/the-evangelicals-engaged-in-spiritual-warfare], 2 [
http://www.npr.org/2011/10/03/140946482/apostolic-leader-weighs-religions-role-in-politics]), and also this collection of articles by author and researcher Rachel Tabachnick [
http://www.talk2action.org/user/Rachel%20Tabachnick/stories].
2011-10-06 "Rick Perry's African-American Outreach Guru Endorsed Vicious Attack on MLK" by Bruce Wilson
[
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-wilson/rick-perrys-africanameric_b_997899.html]
[image, right: screen shot from page 81 of Willie Wooten's 2005 book Breaking The Curse Off Black America]
In 2005, Justice at The Gate ministry head Alice Patterson endorsed a 2005 book, by her fellow apostle Willie Wooten [
http://nppnblog.blogspot.com/2005/08/city-impact-detroit-mi-breaking-curse.html],
which blamed Martin Luther King, Jr. for an alleged 40-year curse on
African Americans and provided, as documentation of King's alleged
misdeeds, a website link to writing posted at a white supremacist,
Holocaust denial website that calls for repeal of the 19th Amendment. [
http://web.archive.org/web/20050219121207/http://christianparty.net/mlk.htm] [
http://web.archive.org/web/20050401034651/http://christianparty.net/holocaust.htm] [
http://web.archive.org/web/20050321033042/http://christianparty.net/19th.htm]
Since
2002 Alice Patterson, working closely with Houston pastor and civil
rights leader C.L. Jackson, and history revisionist David Barton, has
brought a stirring message to African Americans: the Republican Party is
on their side and always has been.
In her 2010 book Bridging The
Racial and Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can Transform a Nation,
Patterson claimed that such efforts have helped to boost Rick Perry's
take of the black vote in Texas, from the Republican national average of
9 percent, up to 16 percent for Perry, who in 2004 praised Patterson,
Jackson, and Barton in an official governor's speech [
http://governor.state.tx.us/news/speech/10415/].
On
August 6th, 2011, Texas Governor Rick Perry stood onstage alongside C.
Peter Wagner's ICA apostle Alice Patterson and pastor C.L. Jackson,
while Perry gave his speech (video of Perry speech [
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gyQjWDjRs4]) at The Response prayer event.
C. Peter Wagner, whose apostles dominated the event [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/9/16/144354/102/],
which served as Perry's de facto presidential campaign kickoff, told
Fresh Air host Terry Gross, in an NPR interview aired October 3, 2011,
that Alice Patterson had organized The Response, per Rick Perry's direct
request [
http://www.npr.org/2011/10/03/140946482/apostolic-leader-weighs-religions-role-in-politics].
If
Rick Perry wins the Republican presidential nomination, Alice Patterson
is positioned to play a key role in working to convince African
Americans to vote for Perry, and her efforts would build upon aggressive
efforts, by Wagner's ICA apostles, and leaders in the wider New
Apostolic Reformation movement, to claim the mantle of "social justice"
and the legacy Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights movement.
QUOTES -
"It
is my belief that the leadership, who spearheaded the civil rights
movement, released ungodliness into the land and now we see the fruit of
it as a curse upon our land!" - Willie Wooten, author of Breaking The
Curse Off Black America [2005, Lumen-us Publications] [
http://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Curse-off-Black-America/dp/097036119X]
"Apostle
Willie F. Wooten from New Orleans, your friendship and leadership are
dear to me. I honor and appreciate you." - Alice Patterson, from
Bridging The Racial and Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can
Transform a Nation [emphasis in original], page 257
[below:
quote from writing by Dr. Ed Fields, on web page linked to on page 81
of Wooten's book Breaking The Curse Off Black America]
"Martin
Luther King was affiliated with 60 Communist Fronts. He openly incited
violence under the banner of "non-violence". King led a bizarre sex life
which included acts of shocking perversion... a cowardly, spineless
Congress voted to make King's birthday a national holiday. This is the
outrage of the century! Until now we had holidays honoring Jesus Christ,
Christopher Columbus and George Washington. We must not allow Marxist
liberals to elevate King to their level. The King holiday must be
repealed!" - Writing by Dr. Ed Fields,. specifically cited in Wooten's
book Breaking The Curse Off Black America (page 81), as posted on the
www.christianparty.net website, under the title "ABOLISH THE KING
HOLIDAY" [
http://web.archive.org/web/20050219121207/http://christianparty.net/mlk.htm]
[below:
quote from editorial introduction to writings attacking Martin Luther
King, Jr., on web page linked to on page 81 of Wooten's book]
"None
of the following articles make the obvious connection between the
jewish control of the American "mainstream media" and an intentional
effort to denigrate Martin Luther by promoting a black criminal with the
phony name of "Martin Luther King" " - editorial introduction to
writings on web page (posted at www.christianparty.net) referenced by
Willie Wooten, on page 81 of Breaking the Curse Off Black America [
http://web.archive.org/web/20050219121207/http://christianparty.net/mlk.htm]
[below: endorsement of Willie Wooten's book Breaking the Curse Off Black America, from Alice Patterson]
"One
of the most powerful books I've ever read was penned recently by my
friend, Apostle Willie Wooten from New Orleans, LA. It's called,
Breaking the Curse Off Black America. God has given Apostle Wooten
divine revelation... Apostle Wooten lays a Biblical foundation as he
defines a curse then matches statistics to each characteristic. God
showed him when the curse came in and why and how to break it... I
encourage you to order the book from his church's website and pass it on
to others who need to read this very important revelation. You can
order his book at www.gideonchristianfellowship.org or by calling his
church at (504) 947-4857. " - Endorsement of Wooten's book, by Alice
Patterson, in August 2, 2005 post advertising a Detroit pastors event
with C.L. Jackson and David Barton, titled "Breaking The Curse Off Black
America". [
http://nppnblog.blogspot.com/2005/08/city-impact-detroit-mi-breaking-curse.html]
[below:
endorsements of Alice Patterson and her book Bridging The Racial and
Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can Transform a Nation, by Willie
Wooten]
"RACE RELATIONS AND HIDDEN BLACK HISTORY are brought to
light in this book by my good friend, Alice Patterson. She presents a
thorough, incisive, serious, and compelling story about how God dealt
with her concerning racism, repentance, and reconciliation. Alice's
heartfelt story reveals the principles she learned, the evil structures
she discovered, and God-given strategies to dismantle the structures." -
Willie F. Wooten, Author of Breaking The Curse Off Black America, from
the back cover of Alice Patterson's book Bridging The Racial and
Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can Transform a Nation [2010,
Transformational Publications, a division of Harvest Evangelism, Inc.]
"In
this book, my good friend, Alice Patterson, the granddaughter of a
deceased Ku Klux Klan member, presents a thorough, incisive, serious,
and compelling story about how God dealt with her concerning racism.
Alice tells the heartfelt story of the principles she learned, the evil
structures she discovered, and reveals the God-given strategies to
dismantle the structures. This book touches on race relations, politics,
hidden Black history, and most of all, repentance and reconciliation. A
wealth of information can be learned from this rich and interesting
study." - Willie F. Wooten endorsement of Alice Patterson's Bridging The
Racial and Political Divide: How Godly Politics Can Transform a Nation,
as posted on Patterson's Justice at The Gate ministry website [
http://www.justiceatthegate.org/]
Willie
Wooten is not a peripheral figure in Alice Patterson's ethnic outreach
program. Until a few weeks ago, Alice Patterson's Justice At The Gates
ministry website was selling CDs and DVDs with footage from a massive
March 12-13, 2007 "African American Pastors' and Leaders' VIP Summit"
event in Austin, TX attended, by some accounts, by hundreds of pastors
and headlined, according to the description from Patterson's website, by
Patterson, Wooten, former Secretary of Education Rod Paige, Governor
Rick Perry, Dr. James Leininger, and others.
Rick Perry's official Texas Governor's website features a speech Perry gave at the 2007 Austin rally [
http://governor.state.tx.us/news/speech/9407/]. As described on Patterson's website, Wooten and Patterson were the third and fourth speakers at the event:
"Apostle
Willie Wooten recounted how God called a small church in New Orleans to
impact the Louisiana Legislature. Alice Patterson shared about her
family history with the Ku Klux Klan, repented and asked God to heal
hearts and break bondages. Every speaker delivered a fresh word under
the anointing of the Holy Spirit. From the opening prayers to the
worship to information about policy and political issues, God's blessing
was upon the entire meeting"
Currently under heavy attack for
allegedly racist ties, presidential hopeful Rick Perry can point to his
aggressive promotion of African-Americans to Texas government, his
friendship with a least one significant civil rights leader (C.L.
Jackson), and his close association with the ethnic and racial outreach
effort led by Alice Patterson, former Texas state GOP chair Susan
Weddington, C.L. Jackson, and David Barton--built around theatrical
events featuring Alice Patterson's emotional public repentance for her
grandfather's participation in the Ku Klux Klan.
While some media
outlets have tried to depict her personal history as a stigma for Rick
Perry, Alice Patterson's repentance for racism resonates both with
secular American culture and with a deep evangelical tradition of
repentance and redemption that resonates across racial, ethnic, and
cultural lines.
In mythic America, citizens can always pick up the
pieces, and start anew; in evangelical culture, even the most depraved
of sinners, who sincerely repent, are forgiven and redeemed. The worse
the sin, the greater the triumphal redemption.
Patterson's
outreach events to African American pastors, not only in Texas but
reaching at least as far afield as Detroit, seem so far to have proven
successful. But these events are designed around evangelizing
techniques, developed by leaders in C. Peter Wagner's New Apostolic
Reformation, commonly referred to under the title "Identificational
Repentance and Reconciliation", that drag a host of divisive and
offensive theological concepts in tow, including the idea that entire
"people groups", including ethnic and racial groups, can (and usually
do) carry collective "generational curses" incurred by alleged ancestral
misdeeds.
For example, following Rick Perry's The Response prayer event, leading Wagner prophet and ICA apostle Cindy Jacobs claimed [
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/jacobs-response-broke-curse-native-american-cannibals]
that the event had lifted an ancient, ancestral curse over parts of
Texas incurred because of Native American cannibalism and violence
(video of Jacobs, making claim [
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibsTiOzpSeU].)
One
of the major professional bodies in Peter Wagner's NAR is the
International Coalition of Apostles, which Wagner headed from its 2001
launch into the year 2010. While Wagner's European-American ICA apostles
seldom seem to delve into the vilification of racial and ethnic groups,
non-white ICA apostles can be found venturing astonishing attacks,
including ICA apostle Kim Daniels' suggestion, made on page 98 of
Daniels' 2002 book From A Mess To A Miracle (2002, Creation House Press,
a part of Strang Communications Company) that Africans are unusually
prone to sex with demons (see here, for quote [
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2011/5/5/105539/4398].)
In a related vein, Barbara Robinson Smith, who serves under the
"apostolic covering" of ICA apostles Jacquie Tyre and Venessa Battle,
claims, in her book Breaking Racism at The Root (2007, Xulon Press),
that the continent of
Africa is collectively cursed because of, as described in the Bible,
the Egyptian pharaoh's enslavement of the ancient Israelites.
2011-09-30 "It 'could come back to
haunt him': Rick Perry's alleged ties to 'demon seeing' and KKK-linked
religious leader could derail campaign" from "Daily Mail" newspaper
[
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2043435/Rick-Perrys-alleged-ties-demon-seeing-KKK-linked-religious-leader-derail-campaign.html]
Rick
Perry's possible link to a religious 'apostle' known for incendiary
remarks may have a serious impact on his 2012 White House bid.
Alice
Patterson helped organize a religious rally - dubbed 'The Response' -
last month, and was even embraced by Gov Perry on stage.
But
Patterson, who serves as ‘an apostle’ with the New Apostolic
Reformation, and her beliefs may cost the 2012 presidential hopeful.
Mrs Patterson, whose grandfather was in the Ku Klux Klan, now focuses on ‘racial healing.'
In
her 2010 book, Bridging the Racial & Political Divide: How Godly
Politics Can Transform a Nation, Mrs Patterson ripped gays and former
president George W Bush for appointing 'an open homosexual to high
office.'
She was referring to Scott Evertz, who served on the White House Office of National AIDS policy under Mr Bush.
In another excerpt from her book, she wrote: 'Lord, Father, what is the demonic structure behind the Democratic Party?'
Forrest
Wilder, a journalist for the Texas Observer who attended the The
Response, told the Enquirer that Gov Perry’s connection with Mrs
Patterson and her group could be more intimate than some may think.
Mr Wilder said: 'Not only did Perry embrace Patterson, he mentioned that they’ve often prayed together.'
He added: 'His relationship with them could come back to haunt him.'
Rachel
Tabachnik, a journalists and expert on the New Apostalic Reformation
told the Enquirer: 'Gov Perry’s public embrace of the movement is
unprecedented and a decision that could backfire.’
It would not be the first time a religious figure stirred the pot on the campaign trail.
President Obama's 2008 campaign was nearly shattered after the rants of his former pastor Jeremiah Wright hit the airwaves.
Rev
Wright argued in one sermon that the 9/11 attacks were evidence that
'America’s chickens are coming home to roost' before saying 'not God
Bless America! God Damn America!'
President Obama later cut all ties to the radical reverend.
A political insider told the Enquirer: 'Wright almost destroyed Obama’s chances, and Patterson could do the same for Perry.'
2011-10-14 "Oklahoma Republican Thinks Gays Out to Kill Her" by Paul Canning
[
http://www.care2.com/causes/oklahoma-republican-thinks-gays-out-to-kill-her.html]
Infamous
Oklahoma Republican state legislator Sally Kern now says she fears LGBT
human rights campaigners may kill her over her homophobic views.
Earlier this year Kern claimed that homosexuality has killed more people in the US than terrorism [
http://www.care2.com/causes/rep-sally-kern-gays-more-of-a-threat-than-terrorism.html]. For that, she got a standing ovation from fellow Republicans in Oklahoma [
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=20080311_1_A9_hUnde16804].
She also thinks that “women usually don’t want to work as hard as a man.” [
http://www.care2.com/causes/oklahoma-representative-women-dont-want-to-work-as-hard-as-men.html]
She
has blamed gay marriage and President Obama’s official acknowledgment
of Gay and Lesbian Pride Month for the economic crisis [
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=12&articleid=20090702_12_0_hrimgs503529].
She claims that ‘several city councils across the country have been taken over by gay people.’ [
http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=12&articleid=20090702_12_0_hrimgs503529]
Now, she claims to feel “physical fear” when she reads emails criticizing her views.
She claims to have received death threats that caused her to hire a bodyguard [
http://web.archive.org/web/20080412082101/http://www.cwfa.org/articles/14871/CFI/misc/index.htm].
But the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation officer who reviewed
Kern’s emails said, “I wouldn’t characterize them as death threats.”
Appearing
on the conservative religious radio show WallBuilders Live to sell her
book ‘The Stoning of Sally Kern’, she told hosts David Barton and Rick
Green that “fear gripped my whole body” when LGBT people complained
about her comparing them to terrorists and telling fellow Republicans
that the “homosexual agenda is destroying this nation.”
Apparently Mr and Mrs Kern “asked ourselves the question, are we willing to even lose our lives over this?”
rightwingwatch.org posted the audio of her saying [
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/barton-kern-stoke-fears-gays-and-lesbians-threaten-lives-critics]:
“I
have to be honest with you Rick, when I was sitting there in my car
that day and when she told me that those emails were coming from
homosexuals, honestly, fear gripped by whole body, because I was very
aware of the homosexual lobbyists and the power that they have. And
people say, ‘oh you’re so brave, so heroic,’ but I’m not, I’m just a
sinner saved by grace and I was gripped with fear that day. I just said,
‘Lord, what have I done?’
“Honestly, and I mentioned this in the
book, the Saturday night when my husband and I sit down and really
talked about this and prayed about it, when we asked ourselves the
question, are we willing to even lose our lives over this? I can’t tell
you, Rick, how liberating that was, it really was."
Speaking last month to Peter LaBarbera (aka ‘Porno Pete‘ [
http://www.care2.com/causes/joemygod.blogspot.com/2009/12/porno-pete-anthem.html]) of the hate group (according to the Southern Poverty Law Center) Americans for Truth, Kern said:
“You
know if you just look at it in practical terms, which has destroyed and
ended the life of more people? Terrorism attack here in America or
HIV/AIDS?
“In the last 20 years, 15 to 20 years, we’ve had maybe
three terrorist attacks on our soil with a little over 5,000 people
regrettably losing their lives. In the same time frame, there have been
hundreds of thousands who have died because of having AIDS. So which
one’s the biggest threat?
“And you know, every day our young
people, adults too, but especially our young people, are bombarded at
school, in movies, in music, on TV, in the mall, in magazines, they’re
bombarded with ‘homosexuality is normal and natural.’ It’s something
they have to deal with every day. Fortunately we don’t have to deal with
a terrorist attack every day, and that’s what I mean."
She added:
“It’s [homosexuality] more dangerous [than terrorism], and yes I think
that it’s also more dangerous because it will tear down the moral fibre
of this nation.”
2011-10-18 "Tennessee Commission Gives Family Planning Contract to Religious Health Group" by Robin M.
[
http://www.care2.com/causes/tennessee-family-planning-contract.html]
If
you want low cost birth control around the Memphis area, you had better
be willing to put up with a little proselytizing while you get it. The
Shelby County commission has voted 9 to 4 to take their Title X funding
away from Planned Parenthood Greater Memphis Region and instead give it
to Christ Community Health Services, a Christian religious health care
organization that “will provide high-quality health care to the
underserved in the context of distinctively Christian service.”
So
what will change for those who need contraception? First of all,
Emergency Contraception will no longer be available on site due to
“religious objections,” despite the fact that EC is not an
abortifacient. They will instead offer it through a “third party,”
which will delay the amount of time it will take for a woman to get the
medication, making it much more likely she will miss the window of the
few days that the preventative drug can work.
Also new to former
Planned Parenthood patients? The sermons that may accompany their
health screenings and birth control pickups. One Christ Community
patient testified at the commission that, “[S]he received a plastic box
of birth control pills that she held up before the audience. She said
Christ Community provides high-quality medical services, but that they
sometimes come with a ‘sermon.’ She said that she had once been told:
‘If only my relationships with people and God were right, I would have
fewer health problems.’” [
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2011/oct/17/shelby-county-commission-votes-family-planning-con/]
And
of course, you can forget any sort of referral if you do decide you
want an abortion, or even a follow up with a clinic that is associated
with abortions. Christ Community Health Services’ lead physician made
it clear that “staffers will not direct patients to abortion clinics or
make formal referrals to providers who terminate pregnancies.”
But
don’t worry. They said they’ll still love you and will see you if you
come back for a follow up after having one. Just be ready for a little
more preaching.
2011-10-17 "Cindy Jacobs: "We're on the verge of overturning Roe v. Wade" by God Discussion Reporter
[
http://www.goddiscussion.com/82970/cindy-jacobs-were-on-the-verge-of-overturning-roe-v-wade/]
Cindy Jacobs, "apostle" and "prophet" of Generals International says, "We're on the verge of overturning Roe v. Wade."
Jacobs has excitedly announced "Reformation Day" where "thousands of people" will participate in intercessory prayer hosted live on the Internet. She and other New Apostolic Reformation / 7 Mountains Dominionist leaders, such as Chuck Pierce, Dutch Sheets, Sam Rodriguez and C. Peter Wagner, will be "giving the word of the Lord" and preparing the nation for the 2012 elections.
According to the Reformation Day web page [
http://www.generals.org/reformationday], "… recent weather reports of hurricanes, tsunamis, and earthquakes are signs that the earth is groaning for the revelation of the Sons of God."
"I believe if we ever needed intercession, it is right now," proclaimed Jacobs, urging people to cry out to God. "Help us turn our nations to righteousness. [...] Can you imagine thousands of people, through the miracle of technology, will be interceding together to bring a reformation to Biblical values — pro-life, pro-Biblical defense of marriage, we are so excited! We believe here in the United States, we are on the verge of overturning Roe v. Wade."
Reformation Day 2011 from
Generals International on
Vimeo.
2011-10-11 "Jim Wallis to Religion Reporters: Stop Stereotyping Evangelicals" by Napp Nazworth from "The Christian Post"
[
http://www.christianpost.com/news/jim-wallis-to-religion-reporters-stop-stereotyping-evangelicals-57788/]
Jim
Wallis, President of Sojourners, urged religion reporters to stop
stereotyping evangelicals in an op-ed for The Huffington Post [
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-wallis/defining-%3Ca%20href='/topics/evangelicals/'%20class='topicLine'%3Eevangelicals%3C/a%3E-in_b_987893.html].
A
group of activists and bloggers responded with an open letter to Wallis
claiming that his charge is “unfair and unsubstantiated.” [
http://www.au.org/media/press-releases/archives/2011/10/wallis-letter-october-2011.pdf]
“Millions
of evangelicals are neither conservative Republicans, part of the
Religious Right, nor members of the tea party, and they don't believe
that Christian 'Dominionists' or any other religious group, should take
over America – despite what a rash of recent articles and commentaries
have said,” Wallis wrote in his Sept. 29 editorial for The Huffington
Post.
Some liberal news publications have tried to advance the
notion that politically conservative Christians are influenced by
“dominionist” theology which seeks to impose an Old Testament
“theocracy” onto the American public. The charge has been widely rebuked
by conservatives.
With Wallis' article, and a USA Today editorial by religion reporter Mark Pinsky [
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/story/2011-09-18/evangelical-christians-republicans/50457192/1], which Wallis cited in his article, voices from the left side of the political spectrum have now also debunked the claims.
A profile of presidential candidate Michele Bachmann by Ryan Lizza for The New Yorker brought the issue to the fore [
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/08/15/110815fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all].
In that article, Lizza erroneously attributes Christian
Reconstructionsim, or what he calls “dominionism,” to influential
evangelical theologian Francis Schaeffer.
As with many
evangelicals of her generation, Bachmann was influenced by Shaeffer's
work. Bachmann, by extension, must be a “dominionist,” Lizza concludes.
“We
have the most theocratic Republican field in American history,”
Michelle Goldberg wrote in an Aug. 24 column for The Daily Beast, a
liberal website [
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/08/14/dominionism-michele-bachmann-and-rick-perry-s-dangerous-religious-bond.html]. Goldberg used Lizza's article to support her claims.
The
belief that Christian Republican candidates are “closet theocrats”
influenced by “reconstructionist” theology is common in the liberal
blogosphere. Due to lack of empirical evidence or scholarly research on
the topic, the mainstream press has largely ignored the claims.
“I'm
as left wing a Democrat as they come, and I have lived among and
reported on evangelicals for nearly 20 years. Let me tell you, this
sensational, misleading mishegas [Yiddish for 'craziness'] has got to
stop,” Pinsky wrote.
A group of liberal bloggers and activists
have written an open letter to Wallis condemning his op-ed and his
praise for Pinsky's words.
“You may recognize some of us as people
who have written in recent years about such tendencies in modern
Christian evangelicalism as dominionism, apocalyptic demonization,
Christian Reconstructionism, and the New Apostolic Reformation. We see
these forces as playing a significant role in our religious and
political lives,” the letter states.
“These exclusionary Christian
movements and tendencies are real, overlapping, and significant in
evangelicalism specifically and in our political and electoral culture
at large. We invite our readers to consider that there are aspects to
these movements and tendencies that are profoundly problematic, and we
invite you to consider that as well.”
Neither Lizza nor Goldberg
signed the letter. At least three of the signers work for American's
United for Separation of Church and State, which appears to be the main
group behind the letter.
In a blog post introducing the letter,
Rob Boston, Senior Policy Analyst for American's United, repeated the
false claim that “Christian Reconstructionists like the late Rousas John
Rushdoony laid the intellectual groundwork for today’s Religious
Right.” [
http://blog.au.org/2011/10/06/special-delivery-fourteen-writers-remind-jim-wallis-that-the-religious-right-is-a-real-problem/]
There
has been no response from Wallis on the Sojourner's website. Wallis was
traveling on Monday and unavailable to provide a response to The
Christian Post.
2011-09-22 "Dominion Denial: Methinks Chuck Colson Doth Protest Too Much"
[
http://blog.au.org/2011/09/22/dominion-denial-methinks-chuck-colson-doth-protest-too-much/]
Do Religious Right zealots want to take “dominion” in America and govern according to their version of biblical law?
Of
course they do. But all of a sudden, leaders of the movement say they
don’t. Stung by a series of articles exposing the dominionist agenda,
they are desperately trying to rebrand themselves as moderates.
Take Chuck Colson, for example.
In a Sept. 7 column [
http://www.breakpoint.org/bpcommentaries/entry/13/17786], Colson heatedly denied that he and his camp want a fundamentalist Christian theocracy.
“Now,
there are such things as Christian theocrats, usually called
‘theonomists,’ but they’re a tiny fringe,” he wrote. “The people being
labeled ‘theocrats’ and ‘Dominionists’ by the press today don’t want the
United States governed by a Christian equivalent of sharia law. Like,
Dr. [Martin Luther] King, they simply believe that their religious
positions and moral convictions don’t disqualify them from the public
square.”
A week later, Colson returned to the topic [
http://www.breakpoint.org/bpcommentaries/entry/13/17834].
He accused progressives of playing “six degrees of separation” with
Religious Right leaders. Just because raging Christian Reconstructionist
theocrat Rousas J. Rushdoony influenced Religious Right guru Francis
Schaeffer who in turn influenced everyone in the modern-day Religious
Right doesn’t mean, Colson says, that they all are Rushdoony-style
theocrats.
“The people playing this game,” Colson asserted, “must
appreciate how unfair this is…. Yet, they play on. Instead of engaging
us on the level of ideas, they impugn our motives. Instead of asking us
what we really think, they find some obscure crank and then draw lines
linking us to him or her.”
Colson, of course, is partly right.
Guilt by association is wrong. But when he claims that he and his fellow
Religious Right leaders are not dominionists, he’s merely covering his
tracks.
Colson knows that Americans overwhelmingly oppose the politicization of churches [
http://blog.au.org/2011/08/25/prostituting-the-pulpit-religious-right-wants-churches-to-get-partisan-but-most-americans-don’t/] and support the separation of church and state [
http://www.au.org/media/church-and-state/archives/2011/09/constitution-mandates.html]. If he and his cronies are too candid about their agenda, Americans are certain to reject it.
But that doesn’t mean Colson isn’t a dominionist. In friendly settings, he has freely admitted it.
In
June 2007, Colson addressed the pastors conference of the Southern
Baptist Convention, a denomination dominated by fundamentalists. (The
speech was reported at EthicsDaily.com [
http://www.ethicsdaily.com/colson-warns-southern-baptists-about-islam-atheism-cms-9040].)
“What
is our purpose in life?” Colson asked. “It is to restore the fallen
culture to the glory of God. It’s to take command and dominion over
every aspect of life, whether it’s music, science, law, politics,
communities, families – to bring Christianity to bear in every single
area of life.”
Hmmm. “Take command and dominion over every aspect of life.”
Now, forgive me for taking Colson’s own words seriously, but that sounds like dominionism to me.
And
Colson is no “obscure crank.” He’s the reigning elder statesman of the
Religious Right, a major player whose books, columns and training
programs have widespread influence in the movement.
Other Religious Right leaders have used similar theocratic language.
I
don’t think all of them want to impose a Rushdoony-style theocracy on
America. Frankly, too many of them have strayed to favor the death
penalty for acts of adultery and homosexuality.
I do think they
want to tear down the wall of separation between church and state so
they can fund religious schools and other ministries with taxpayer
dollars, pervade public schools with their religious perspective, ban
all abortions, deny basic civil rights to the LGBT community and festoon
courthouses and other public buildings with the symbols of their faith.
That
may not be the definition of full-blown theocracy, but it’s too close
to it for my tastes. Sorry, Chuck. We aren’t mischaracterizing your
agenda. We’re exposing it.
And one more thing, Chuck: You’re no
Martin Luther King. Dr. King worked to expand civil rights for all
Americans. He didn’t try to impose a sectarian agenda that denied basic
liberties to others. Stop comparing your movement to his. It’s
offensive.
2011-09-21 "Billionaire Bishop Charged With Bilking Brazil's Pentacostals, Sending Money to US" by Eric Ehrmann
[
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-ehrmann/edir-macedo_b_973562.html]
Tagging
her "Dynamite Dilma," Newsweek is giving Americans a closer look at the
first woman leader to open a session of the UN General Assembly on the
cover of their latest edition. But back in Brazil she's setting off
political pyrotechnics with a tough anti-corruption campaign that could
mean hard time for leaders of faith-based groups who preach the evils of
government while sticking the hand of god into the cookie jar.
After
a long investigation by the federal police Brazil's attorney general is
finally litigating the big fraud and racketeering case against the
self-anointed Pentecostal Bishop Edir Macedo, founder and leader of the
Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (UCKG).
With
a net worth estimated at $2 billion and a cathedral and palatial home
in Miami, Bishop Macedo's fortune equals that of Manhattan real estate
tycoon Donald Trump.
The billionaire bishop wields
considerable political influence through his 90 percent ownership of
Rede Record, one of the largest privately held media organizations in
the Americas. According to Brazilian and English websites Rede Record
reaches over 170 nations on five continents and maintains an affiliate
relationship with Atlanta-based CNN International. While families
struggle to pay high fees to cable TV operators content offered by TV
Record penetrates 77% of Brazilian households as an open channel, free
to all. Bishop Macedo is Brazil's most popular televangelist.
Baptized
a Roman Catholic, Macedo worked for the national lottery before
founding his church in 1976, inspired by the teachings of Canadian
Pentacostal Bishop Bob Macelester. He then developed his personal brand
of preaching called "prosperity theology" which gained him favor with
the US-backed military junta because it countered the Catholic doctrines
of liberation theology that were popular among Brazil's militant left.
Bishop
Macedo, former congressman Bishop João Batista Ramos da Silva and two
other senior churchmen must now prove that they are innocent of forming a
quadrilha, the Brazilian equivalent of a RICO rap. They are charged
with conspiracy, money laundering, tax evasion, capital flight to US and
other offshore banks and defrauding UCKG members.
Bishop
Ramos da Silva was apprehended by authorities at the BrasÃlia airport
accompanying seven suitcases containing 10 million reals in cash. Veja
magazine has reported that the found money represented tithes
made by economically disadvantaged UCKG members to support church
projects they were told would increase their personal wealth.
Because
it involves an Apostolic Pentecostal denomination operating in a nation
where the Roman Catholic church is the official religion the case of
the billionaire bishop presents a strong test for the fabric of Brazil's
constitutional republic and the politics of social inclusion
implemented by Dilma and former president Lula.
As a frequent
public critic of Roman Catholics and Afro-Brazilian religions Bishop
Macedo has molded his 8 million Apostolic followers into a spiritual
army who seek to convert or exclude -- not include -- people who do not
hold their beliefs. They are crusading for the same theocratic agenda
proffered by the predominantly Caucasian American New Apostolic
Reformation movement that is backing Texas republican governor Rick
Perry in his bid to unseat president Barack Obama in the 2012 US
election.
The visceral, theocratic stage presence of Macedo and
Perry hearkens back to the windup and pitch pioneered by former Major
League Baseball star and Apostolic evangelist Billy Sunday, who dazzled
Americans during Prohibition, the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the
Great Depression.
Brazil's
12 million followers of the US-guided Assemblies of God church also
support the key messages voiced by Macedo and Perry, notably downsizing
government infrastructure, crushing organized labor, replacing public
education with fundamentalist religious schooling, chastising gays are
sinners and denying women the right to choose. A corruption
scandal involving an Assemblies of God pastor recently resulted in
dozens of arrests and caused the resignation of the minister for tourism
from Dilma's cabinet.
The most contentious anti-Catholic act
committed by Bishop Macedo's church featured Bishop Sergio von Helde
captured by the scientific miracle of television beating on and cursing a
statue of Brazil's patron saint Our Lady Aparecida, on the national
holiday honoring her. Bishop Macedo issued a generic apology, then
counter-attacked, blaming Rede Globo, his main competitor in the open
channel TV market for exploiting the event to boost its market share.
The
Aparecida affair, reminiscent of Templars who were burned at the stake
for spitting on the image of Jesus after losing control of the Holy
Land, touched off a national conversation in Brazil speculating on
whether the billionaire bishop is an agent of Freemasonry that continues
to be fueled by mainstream and online media.
Amping up the conspiratorial tone of the coverage, the Guardian [
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/13/brazil-church-embezzling-millions-poor] has even reported that
Bishop
Macedo, who praises John D. Rockefeller and other "robber barons" in
his sermons, has received funding from Rockefeller interests.
Portugal, which colonized Brazil was the only European nation to not ban
the Templars and Freemasonry after the pullback from the Holy Land and
the Inquisition. Like the Roman Catholic organization Opus Dei, the
Templars and Freemasonry have factions and agendas that cut both ways.
But in Macedo's case, regardless of his side-beliefs, his methods are an
impediment to inter-faith dialogue in Brazil and represent extremism in
a global economy facing unstable institutions.
As the world's
largest Roman Catholic nation, Brazil is well placed to provide a
candidate who could be selected as the next Pope. But if justice in the
case against Bishop Macedo and his quadrilha is not definitive and he
maneuvers out of charges or makes deals with prosecutors -- as he has
done in the past -- he could rebound with a coalition of followers who
seek to damage Brazil's reputation in Catholic circles world-wide. His
ability to provide media coverage to favored politicians and NGOs could
cause problems for Dilma's tenuous coalition in the run up to the 2014
presidential vote.
If one accepts the concept of manufactured
faith, Bishop Macedo and his mystical theocratic visions are
transforming Brazil's Pentecostals into a religion on steroids.
Ironically, his $200 million replica of The Temple of Solomon that was
used by the Templars in Jerusalem has drawn praise from some Jewish
groups in the US and is scheduled to open in São Paulo before Brazil
hosts the 2014 World Cup, during the heat of the next presidential
election campaign.
2011-08-25 "Rachel Tabachnick talks dominionism on Fresh Air (and why you should be paying attention)" by Alan Bean
[
http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/2011/08/25/rachel-tabachnick-talks-dominionism-on-fresh-air-and-why-you-should-be-paying-attention/]
Are Rick Perry and Michelle Bachmann part of a movement determined to forcibly Christianize every aspect of American culture?
If so, why does a blog dedicated to ending mass incarceration care one way or the other?
If
Rachel Tabachnick is anything to go by, the answer to the first
question is ‘yes’. Tabachnick knows more about the dominionist strain
within contemporary evangelicalism than just about anybody and you
simply must check out her recent interview with Terry Gross of Fresh
Air. [
https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=139781021])
I
am still thinking through my answer to the “so what” question (and will
have more to say on the subject as my thinking clarifies); but the
rough outline of an answer came to me yesterday when a reporter asked me
why Louisiana (unlike Texas and Mississippi) has done nothing to reform
its criminal justice system.
The avuncular visage of Burl Cain
sprang to mind. Cain is slowly transforming the Angola prison
plantation into a spiritual rehabilitation center. Inmates (90% of them
in for life) are repeatedly invited to get right with Jesus. Life
becomes a whole lot easier if they take the offer.
Then I thought
of Ann Richards, the progressive Texas Governor who, during her
ill-fated re-election campaign against George W. Bush, told the voters
that she wanted to build more prisons so folks with addiction issues
could get rehabilitated.
Burl Cain and his Louisiana fan club want to lock up more people every year so earnest evangelists can have a captive audience.
Friends
of Justice works in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi, three states that
are gradually backing away from the punitive consensus that has
controlled the American judicial system for more than three decades.
Texas was embarrassed into rethinking mass incarceration through a
series of scandals: Tulia (the bizarre drug bust that gave birth to
Friends of Justice), Hearne (the American Violet story), the Dallas
Sheetrock scandal, the Houston crime lab, the Texas Youth Commission
fiasco, an incredible string of DNA exonerations in Dallas County and
Governor Perry’s botched attempt to silence the Texas Forensic Science
Commission. Thanks to a series of modest reforms, the Texas prison
population has now plateaued in the 160,000 range (it was 40,000 in
1980) and will likely stay there for the foreseeable future.
Mississippi
experienced a 3.5% drop in its prison population in a single year by
deciding that inmates must only serve 25% of sentences before being
eligible for parole (it had been 85%).
The old “lock ‘em up”
mentality is beginning to soften even in the state that boasts the
highest incarceration rate in the free world. Folks in Louisiana want
to lock up as many people as possible out of a misdirected sense of
compassion. After all, isn’t it better to find Jesus in jail than to
live an unregenerate life in the free world? We don’t hate criminals in
Louisiana; we just want what’s best for them.
This is precisely
the kind of theocratic logic that politicians like Rick Perry and
Michelle Bachmann have embraced. They want to Christianize the nation
(by force if necessary) the way Burl Cain has Christianized the Angola
plantation. And if the liberals presently controlling Hollywood, the
recording industry, the public school system, the evening news and the
political life of the nation don’t want to be Christianized, that’s just
too bad. Michelle, Sarah, Rick et al are God’s anointed apostles. At
Angola, to oppose Burl Cain is to oppose God; the New Apostolic
Reformation wants to extend this kind of thinking to every aspect of our
national life.
Do the politicians currently feeding at the trough
of radical religion really believe that the eclectic vitality of a
diverse nation can be homogenized by the blood of the Lamb? Maybe not.
But they want to push the political envelope as far in that direction
as the public will allow. In these strange times, it’s smart politics.
If you think I’m overstating the case, please read Ms. Tabachnick’s conversation with Terry Gross.
The Evangelicals Engaged In Spiritual Warfare
August 24, 2011 - TERRY GROSS, host:
This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross.
An
emerging Christian movement that seeks to take dominion over politics,
business and culture in preparation for the end times and the return of
Jesus is establishing a presence in American politics. The leaders are
considered apostles and prophets, gifted by God for this role.
The
International Apostolic and Prophetic Movement was named the New
Apostolic Reformation, or NAR, by its leading architect, C. Peter
Wagner. My guest, Rachel Tabachnick, has been researching and writing
about this movement. She says although the movement is larger than the
network of apostles organized by Wagner, and not all those connected
with the movement describe themselves as part of Wagner’s NAR, the
apostles and prophets of the movement have an identifiable ideology that
separates them from other Evangelicals.
Two ministries
in the movement, The Call, led by Lou Engle, and the International
House of Prayer, led by Mike Bickle, helped organize Rick Perry’s recent
prayer rally, where apostles and prophets from around the nation spoke
or appeared on stage.
The Kenyan pastor who anointed
Sarah Palin at the Wasilla Assembly of God Church in 2005 while praying
for Jesus to protect her from the spirit of witchcraft is also part of
this movement.
My guest, Rachel Tabachnick, researches
the impact of the religious right and end-time narratives on American
politics. She writes for the website Talk To Action.
Rachel
Tabachnick, welcome to FRESH AIR. For people who haven’t heard about
the New Apostolic Reformation, and I’d say that’s the majority of the
people, overwhelmingly, what are some of the basic beliefs or goals of
this group?
Ms. RACHEL TABACHNICK: I would say the
basic belief began with the idea of dominionism, and dominionism is
simply that Christians of this belief system must take control over all
the various institutions of society and government. They have some
unusual concepts of what they call spiritual warfare that have not been
seen before in other groups.
Spiritual warfare is a
common term in Evangelicalism and in Christianity, but they have some
unique approaches and unique spins on this that distinguish them from
other groups.
GROSS: And that literally have to do with casting demons out of people and religious and…
Ms.
TABACHNICK: They use this in terms of evangelizing. So whereas we might
be accustomed with the idea of saving souls, of missionaries or
evangelical work to save individual souls; they believe that they can,
through this demon warfare, take control over entire communities, or
perhaps nations or people groups, an ethnic group, a religious group and
so forth, because they believe that they are doing spiritual warfare at
this higher level against these demonic principalities, what they call
demonic principalities.
GROSS: So I’ve been reading
about the New Apostolic Reformation. Tell me if you think that I’ve
gotten this right at all. My understanding is that they are a group that
believes in the end times, that there will be a second coming of
Christ, that certain things need to be accomplished on Earth before he
comes, and that it’s their job – it’s the job of the apostles to listen
to what Jesus is telling them so that they can get the world ready for
his second coming. Yes?
Ms. TABACHNICK: Yes, what this
group believes is that they must re-organize Protestant Christianity
under their leadership. So instead of having all of these different
denominations in Protestantism, they would unify the church, the
Protestant Church, into one body under the leadership of their apostles.
And
then the other thing that distinguishes them is this idea that in order
to do this, they must take control over society and government and that
they will do this in large part through this warfare that they are
conducting with demons.
GROSS: So how does this new movement, the New Apostolic Reformation, connect to American politics?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: This is a very political movement. In fact, I would call it
a religio-political movement in that it has networked across the United
States in something that looks like a hybrid between a religious
denomination and a political party.
For example, they
have what are called prayer warrior networks in all 50 states, and they
have very strong opinions about the direction they want the country to
take. They teach what is called dominionism. And the idea of
dominionism, or dominion theology, is that all areas of society and
government should come under the control of God through these apostles
and prophets, and that all of these areas of society should represent
Christian and biblical values.
They have interesting
campaigns. One that’s been very successful for the last few years is
called the Seven Mountains campaign. And what this means is they teach
that they are reclaiming the seven mountains of culture and society. And
those mountains are arts and entertainment, business, education,
family, government, media and religion.
And business is
considered to be one of the most important mountains to reclaim control
because this is the way that they finance the other mountains.
GROSS: So when they want to, like, reclaim government or politics, what does that mean?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: They teach, quite literally, that these mountains have
fallen under the control of demonic influences in society. And
therefore, they must reclaim them for God in order to bring about the
kingdom of God on Earth.
GROSS: And what are some of the major issues that they think are important?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Well, the typical religious right hot-button issues, if you
will, anti-abortion, anti-gay rights – but they also have a
laissez-faire market ideology, the belief that government should not be
involved in social safety nets, that the country is becoming socialist,
if not communist – so a Tea Party mentality.
GROSS: And I think that they also advocate – tell me if I’m wrong here – the privatization of schools – the school system.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Yes. All of the typical, you know, what we’ve come to call
Tea Party issues of very small government. And in the case of the
apostles, they believe this because they believe that a large government
or government that handles the safety net is taking away what is the
domain of the church and of Christianity.
GROSS: And what kind of authority do they want in government?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: They want the authority to align government with what they
believe is the kingdom of God, with biblical values in their
interpretation.
Let me back up and say something about
dominionism. Dominionism is very different than having strong beliefs or
even having very strong beliefs about one’s Evangelical values.
Dominionism is very controversial inside of the conservative and
Evangelical world. It’s a specific theology that states that somehow God
lost control of the Earth when Satan tempted Adam and Eve in the Garden
and that humans must help God regain control of the Earth. And the way
that they do this is by taking dominion over society and government.
The
apostles and prophets have an interesting twist on this. They’re not
the only dominionist movement out there. Some people may be familiar
with Rushdoony and Christian Reconstructionism. This is a different
brand of dominionism.
And the apostles teach what’s
called strategic-level spiritual warfare with the idea being that the
reason why there is sin and corruption and poverty on the Earth is
because the Earth is controlled by a hierarchy of demons under the
authority of Satan.
And so they teach that not just
evangelizing souls one by one, as we’re accustomed to hearing about,
they teach that they will go into a geographic region or to a
people-group and conduct these spiritual-warfare activities in order to
remove the demons from the entire population or the demonic control over
the entire population. And this is what they’re doing that’s quite
different than other conservative Evangelical or fundamentalist groups
of the past.
GROSS: My guest is Rachel Tabachnick. She
writes about the impact of the religious right and end-time narratives
on American politics. She has written about the New Apostolic
Reformation for the website Talk To Action. We’ll talk more after a
break. This is FRESH AIR.
(Soundbite of music)
GROSS:
Let me re-introduce you. For our listeners just tuning in, my guest is
Rachel Tabachnick. She’s a researcher and writer who focuses on the
impact of the religious right on politics and of end-times narratives on
politics.
So one of the reasons why the New Apostolic
Reformation is of interest now is because several of the apostles from
that movement were connected to the recent Rick Perry rally in Texas,
the prayer rally, which was called The Response. A couple of apostles
helped organize the rally. Several others endorsed it. So what is Rick
Perry’s connection to the New Apostolic Reformation?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Well, looking at the event, not only were there apostles
who endorsed it and participated in it, but although the event was
funded, it was sponsored by the American Family Association, it was
organized and led throughout by people from the New Apostolic
Reformation.
And this included numerous leading
apostles who were seen all through the event. The coordinators and
people who led each section were from an event called The Call and which
is associated with the International House of Prayer in Kansas City.
So
actually the event, from beginning to end, was a new apostolic event.
And the major topics at these events, there are three major topics that
you see as they take this event around the world, and that is usually
anti-abortion, anti-gay rights and the conversion of Jews in order to
advance the end times. And this was very visible at Perry’s event, as
these apostles led all of these different prayers and repentance
ceremonies at The Response.
FLATOW: You refer to the
importance of Messianic Judaism in the end-times narrative that the
apostles subscribe to, and you could hear that if you knew what to
listen for at the Rick Perry rally when Rabbi Marty Waldman spoke and
was introduced by Don Finto. And in introducing him, Finto said Waldman
is the son of Holocaust survivors, but he’s come to acknowledge his own
messiah. What does that mean?
Ms. TABACHNICK: Marty
Waldman is a quite-well-known messianic rabbi in Texas. And by
messianic, we mean Jews who have converted to Christianity, but they
retain aspects – they retain a Jewish identity. So they may even retain
many aspects of Jewish practice.
GROSS: This is a group that’s known in the vernacular as Jews for Jesus.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Jews for Jesus is only one group. I would argue that the
network that the apostles have right now supporting messianic Jews
dwarfs Jews for Jesus. It’s a much more extensive network.
And
what was interesting about this was that apostle Don Finto, who
introduced the prayer and introduced Marty Waldman, is an elder
statesman in the movement who spent the last more than a decade working
to encourage churches to support messianic ministries.
And
the reason is that they believe that messianic Jews have a much better
chance of converting Israeli Jews or Jews in various locations around
the world than Christian Evangelicals. And so what they’re doing is
promoting internationally, through all types of events and in magazines
in the movement, promoting the idea that churches should, financially
and in other ways, support messianic ministries in order to advance the
conversion of Jews to Christianity and bring about the end times and the
return of Jesus to the Earth.
GROSS: Yeah, how does the conversion of Jews to Christianity bring about the end times?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: This is a different end-time narrative than what many
people may have been familiar with that comes out of fundamentalism
where the believers are raptured prior to the horrors of the end time
and the rule of the Antichrist.
And this, the believers
remain on Earth, and that’s one thing that makes it quite different.
But another difference is what is holding Jesus back from coming to
Earth is that there has to be a tipping point where a certain number of
Jews in Israel reach out and call for Jesus to come as their messiah.
And so that’s what they were referring to at this Rick Perry event.
Both
Don Finto and Marty Waldman, who were there, are involved in a network
of apostles in this movement that have set up messianic training centers
around the world, in places where there are significant Jewish
populations.
GROSS: So I don’t really know what to make
of this, the fact that two people spoke in kind of covert language
about the importance of Jews converting to Christianity and recognizing
Jesus as their savoir so that Christ can return back to Earth in his
second coming, the fact that that was expressed at a Rick Perry rally. I
have no idea whether any of that reflects Rick Perry’s own views or
not.
Ms. TABACHNICK: I don’t think there’s any way to
know what Perry believes personally. What I can tell you is that this is
a part of a larger package of themes that we saw throughout the entire
event.
The basic idea of this event, as all The Call
events, like this was patterned after, is the idea that in preparation
for the end times, barriers will be broken down, and those barriers will
come down between denominations in Protestantism, between generations,
racial groups, and everyone will come together for the end times as what
they call one new man.
So the idea is that you were
doing all of these activities all around the country, interesting
ceremonies, reconciliation ceremonies, to break down these barriers to
bring everybody together under the banner of Jesus for the end times.
So
a significant component of that is that the resistance of Jews to
conversion is blocking this utopian period in the end times, the
millennial in the end times, when there will not be poverty and death
and corruption, environmental degradation, all of those things will
disappear under the rule of Jesus.
GROSS: Are there
other things that were said at the Rick Perry that would need to have
some background to actually understand because it is a kind of a
separate language, do you know what I mean? Like you wouldn’t really
understand it unless you knew the context.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Yes, all through the event. The three major themes were the
same as we’ve seen in The Call events around the world: One,
anti-abortion, which was expressed with the terms shedding of innocent
blood; two, anti-gay rights, which was expressed in repenting of sexual
immorality; and then third the theme of converting Jews.
Also,
if you were watching the event, you would have noticed that it was very
much about personal repentance and what they called corporate
repentance of the entire country. And this – but the idea of repentance
is that they are repenting of being tolerant of sin. So they are
repenting of being tolerant of abortion and repenting of being tolerant
of what they call sexual perversion.
GROSS: So we don’t
really know what Rick Perry’s own beliefs are on these issues, but we
do know that when he spoke at his prayer rally, he was surrounded on
each side by two of the apostles. Tell us a little bit about those
apostles.
Ms. TABACHNICK: Well, one is an apostle,
Alice Patterson. The other is a well-known African-American pastor, C.L.
Jackson. Alice Patterson wrote a book, published last year, when she
describes the journey that they have been with Perry since 2002.
And
in this book, she explains that the Democratic Party is controlled by a
demonic structure, and their mission was to travel around the state and
to explain to African-American leaders why they should not be in the
Democratic Party.
And on this journey with them was –
and now I’m talking about Alice Patterson and C.L. Jackson, Perry
personally – but as they went around the state since 2002, they had with
them David Barton.
And David Barton is well-known for
his histories in which he claims that the founding fathers had no
intention of separation of church and state. One of his early books was
called “The Myth of Separation.”
And he has a history
in which he credits Democrats with being the source of racism throughout
American history and conservative Evangelicals as being the source of
fighting against slavery and for civil rights.
So they
traveled around Texas. So this – delivering this message to
African-American churches. So the fact that Alice Patterson and C.L.
Jackson were standing with Perry was indeed politically significant.
GROSS:
Rachel Tabachnick will be back in the second half of the show. She’s
been writing about the New Apostolic Reformation for the website Talk To
Action. I’m Terry Gross, and this is FRESH AIR.
(Soundbite of music)
GROSS:
This is FRESH AIR. I’m Terry Gross. We’re talking about an emerging
evangelical movement that seeks to take dominion over politics, business
and culture in preparation for the end times and the return of Jesus.
The movement, dubbed the New Apostolic Reformation, or NAR, is
establishing a presence in American politics. Two ministries in the
movement, The Call, led by Lou Engle, and the International House of
Prayer, led by Mike Bickle, helped organize Rick Perry’s recent prayer
rally.
My guest Rachel Tabachnick has been writing about the New Apostolic Reformation for the website Talk To Action.
One
of the people you may recognize who’s connected to the movement is
Thomas Muthee, the Kenyan pastor who anointed Sarah Palin at the Wasilla
Assembly of God Church in 2005, while praying for Jesus to protect her
from the spirit of witchcraft. A video of that went viral during the
2008 presidential campaign. I asked Tabachnick about Muthee’s connection
to the NAR.
Ms. TABACHNICK: The New Apostolic
Reformation has another campaign that’s been very successful and this is
called Transformations. Transformation is the buzzword for bringing
communities into dominion or gaining dominion over culture and
government in a community. And the movement has put out transformation
videos since 1999.
Thomas Muthee, who was what’s called
anointing Sarah Palin in that grainy video, was a star of the first
transformation movie. And what these movies did, they show vignettes of
communities or locations around the globe which they believe have been
transformed through the supernatural move of God. And the process is
that they, the people in the community come together, repent, pray
together, expel the demons from their community – which they describe in
terms of witches and witchcraft – and then that the community undergoes
a transformation in which there can be miraculous healing, the growth
of very large vegetables and agricultural products, the end of
corruption and crime.
What was totally missed by the
press was the fact that Muthee was an international leader in the
movement at the time and recognized because of his role in this series
of videos. And people became quite fixated on the witchcraft part of it
as opposed to looking at who Muthee was and understanding his role in a
larger movement.
And then the other point I would make
is that although this is a movement that has mostly organized
independent charismatics – so that means charismatics who are not in a
denomination – there are also Pentecostal churches, churches that are in
denominations, that have embraced the very distinct ideology of the
movement. And one of those churches is Wasilla Assembly of God where
Sarah Palin attended for over 20 years, and leaders of the movement have
been there frequently to speak. So who knows what Sarah Palin
personally believes but she certainly had quite a bit of exposure to the
movement.
GROSS: Now you write about this group that
it looks multicultural because they’re reaching out to Native Americans,
to African-Americans, Asian-American, Latinos. There are women apostles
as well as men apostles, and they stress racial reconciliation. But you
say they stress racial reconciliation while literally demonizing all
other religions and belief systems. What do you mean?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: One example would be in the transformation movies. In these
vignettes, the participants do what’s called spiritual warfare and
spiritual mapping in some of the movies. And this is an activity to
isolate where the demons are and then to start doing what they call
strategic level spiritual warfare against those demons.
Let
me explain this concept of strategic level spiritual warfare. They
teach that there are three levels of spiritual warfare. The first is
ground level warfare, which is expulsion of demons exorcism, if you
will, of demons from individuals. This is nothing new. We’ve seen this
for centuries. They have a little – a controversial twist to it because
they teach that born-again Christians can harbor these demons.
Then
they have a second level called occult level spiritual warfare. This
they say is fighting freemasonry, Eastern religions and witchcraft. Then
there’s the third level, strategic level spiritual warfare, which is
removing these principalities they call them, the most powerful demons
that hold in spiritual bondage entire populations. And this might be a
community, a geographic area, what they call a people group, an ethnic
group or a religious group. They literally name these demons and then go
on these excursions to fight these demons.
GROSS: So
let me see if I understand this. Does that mean that these prayer groups
are trying to exorcise mosques and get the demons out of mosques so
that Muslims can convert to Christianity?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: They see the demon as holding sway over a large area, so
over not just the mosque but the entire people group. Let me give you a
specific example about this and this is something that’s coming up this
November. Several groups have come together for another The Call event
which will be in Detroit on November 11th. And the purpose of this one
is to fight the demonic spirit of Islam.
Now I was
listening to a recording. They’re in preparation for this and this has
been going on all throughout the year. And one of the leading apostles,
and one who endorsed Perry’s event, was speaking in a conference call to
a group, and they placed these recordings online, and explaining to
them the way that they were preparing for The Call Detroit. And one of
the things that they’re doing is they’re literally going and putting a
stake in the ground with a verse from Jeremiah at every Masonic lodge in
the state. They have a ceremony to fight the demons and then they put
the stake in the ground.
This is the type of ceremony
that’s been taking place all over the country. In all 50 states,
ceremonies, which they call divorcing Baal – Baal being what the
Israelites worshiped when they abandoned God in the Old Testament.
GROSS:
So the event is in Detroit which is very near Dearborn, Michigan, which
has I think the – or one of the largest populations of Muslims in the
United States.
Ms. TABACHNICK: Mm-hmm.
GROSS: Is that significant?
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Yes, that’s very significant. The purpose of that event is
to fight the spirit of Islam. In other words, to conduct spiritual
warfare against the demons which they claim hold Muslims in bondage and
keep them from converting. Now, of course, this is expressed in terms of
love. They say we don’t hate Muslims. We love Muslims but we hate that
they are in spiritual bondage and don’t convert to Christianity.
GROSS:
So do you think that the people at the rally intend to go to mosques or
directly address Muslims in any way? Like I don’t know how much you
know about what the plan is.
Ms. TABACHNICK: I don’t
know of specific plans. I can give you examples from the past. In 2008,
just before the election, they held one of The Call events in Qualcomm
Stadium in San Diego. This was an event in support of Prop 8.
GROSS: Which was meant to make gay marriage illegal.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Correct. And so in the promotional material put out about
the event, Lou Engle talked about that they had to come together and
pray because this would unleash a spirit more demonic than Islam, was
his words. And prior to that event they did have people who came into
conflict with people in gay communities, because they did have people
going out in the streets and evangelizing and so forth and there were
some conflicts prior to that event.
And also I might
add, by the end of that event which was another daylong event Lou Engle
was calling for martyrs to the cause from the stage. So I am concerned
about the ramifications of the event in Detroit.
GROSS:
So when you say this event is intended to be spiritual warfare against
the intent of Islam, are the organizers of this event publicly saying
that?
Ms. TABACHNICK: Yes. And in fact another person
who has been there preparing for this event is Retired Lieutenant
General William Boykin who is now part of the Oak Initiative. He does
not announce himself as an apostle but he’s a part of this Oak
Initiative which includes many of the leading apostles. And he has been
going to Michigan and speaking about the nine principles of warfare. One
of these principles is offense instead of defense, and he is advising
people that they have to act to prevent mosques from being built before
they are actually constructed.
GROSS: My guest is
Rachel Tabachnick. She writes about the impact of the religious right
and end time narratives on American politics. We’ll talk more after a
break. This is FRESH AIR.
(Soundbite of music)
GROSS:
Now let me move on to Mike Bickle. He is the leader of what is known as
the International House of Prayer and he was one of the organizers of
Rick Perry prayer rally. And he is also semi-famous now for having
described Oprah Winfrey as a forerunner of the harlot movement. He says
she is winsome, kind, reasonable. She is utterly deceived. A classy
woman, a cool woman but she has a spirit of deception and is one of the
forerunners to the harlot movement. Just a brief translation of what you
think he means by that.
Ms. TABACHNICK: He’s talking
about the end times. And in the end times narrative there is what is
called the Great Harlot or the Great Harlot of Mystery Babylon, and this
is a demonic figure in the end times. Throughout Protestant history
this has sometimes been described as being the Roman Catholic Church.
But it represents the apostate religion of the end time.
I
might add Mike Bickle is one of the major thinkers in the movement. And
his embrace of this particular type of ideology, which goes back to the
1940s and 1950s in something called the Latter Rain Movement, but his
embrace of this ideology predates the coalescing of the New Apostolic
Reformation. Mike Bickle was part of what was referred to by others as
the Kansas City Prophets at Metro Christian Fellowship in the 1980s and
1990s. And his embrace of this ideology was very controversial, even
among other independent charismatics at that time.
GROSS:
Now Mike Bickle has what he calls the God School. And on his website he
has the literature from the God School which you can read or watch
videos of, and I just want to quote some of that. This is from the
chapter “The Harlot Babylon: The One World Religion.” He says an angel
gave John one of the most significant prophecies related to the end
times.
John saw a Harlot that will have two global
networks. First, it will be a worldwide religious network of great
tolerance that will bring together the major world religions into one
unified network including Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists,
etcetera, teaching that every road will lead to God and that everybody
is good.
Second, it will be a global economic network.
In the middle of the final seven years of this age the Antichrist’s plan
is to replace the harlot religion of tolerance with Antichrist worship.
This new worldwide religion will be very strict without any toleration.
All who refuse to worship the Antichrist will be killed. Satan’s
purpose for the harlot religious system will be to weaken the
convictions of the people of the major world religions to prepare them
for Antichrist worship.
So if I understand him
correctly, what he’s saying here is that it’s the Antichrist, who’s
responsible for some people’s belief that all the world religions are
good but that’s just the Antichrist’s deception.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Yes. And what they’re saying is you cannot tolerate
tolerance and that you cannot tolerate religious pluralism. The
narrative that he’s describing there has been a common narrative to
American fundamentalism for over 100 years. But there’s one major
difference in what Bickle is teaching there. In the fundamentalist
narrative all of this happens – the seven years of Antichrist rule
happens after the believers have been taken from the earth in the
Rapture.
What Mike Bickle is teaching and – to this
movement is that no, the believers will remain and they have to be ready
to fight and they have to be ready to be martyrs. Now this is a very
different end time narrative that creates a very different activism. If
you are going to still be around and you have to fight that’s very
different than believing that you will be raptured and you’ll just be
watching from the grandstands of heaven.
Also Mike
Bickle’s International House of Prayer is a very youth-oriented
operation and what they’re doing is teaching youths that this will
likely happen in their lifetime and that they must be prepared to be
martyrs.
GROSS: Now we were talking about how demons
figure very prominently in the New Apostolic Reformation. Lou Engle who
is one of the apostles and was one of the organizers of the Rick Perry
rally, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think he said that gays are
possessed of demonic spirits.
Ms. TABACHNICK: Right.
And in fact, in another The Call event Lou Engle spoke at length about
how one of his sons has started an International House of Prayer in the
Castro district of San Francisco, and that his son is now expelling
demons from homosexuals, and supposedly then this cures them of their
homosexuality.
GROSS: Tell us a little bit more about Lou Engle. And again, he’s also organizing the event on November 11th in Detroit.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: Lou Engle has held these The Call events around the world.
In fact he held one in 2008 in Jerusalem which coincided with the Global
Day of Prayer. The Global Day of Prayer is also initiative of the New
Apostolic Reformation movement.
Lou Engle also took The
Call event to Uganda in May of 2010, where various people got on the
stage and promoted the Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda, which is still
pending. It’s a very draconian bill that would allow for execution of
certain offenses and would also allow for people who don’t report
homosexual activity to be jailed.
The apostles have a
long history in Uganda and have – and some of them have had close
relationships with both political and religious leaders there. And in
fact, an apostle in the movement in Uganda takes credit for promoting
the Anti-Homosexuality Bill and was recognized by the Parliament of
Uganda when the bill was introduced.
GROSS: Can I just
end this interview on a kind of personal note, personal on your behalf?
You said that you spent the first half of your life as a Southern
Baptist and the second half as a Jew.
(Soundbite of laughter)
GROSS: So…
Ms. TABACHNICK: Yes.
GROSS: What changed?
Ms. TABACHNICK: I got married.
(Soundbite of laughter)
GROSS: Oh, OK. OK.
Ms.
TABACHNICK: But having that background, having the Southern Baptist
background and growing up in the Deep South, has helped me to be able to
do this research. And it’s also helped me to realize something that
might not be apparent to some other people looking at the movement, that
this is quite radically different than the evangelicalism of my youth.
And the things that we’ve been talking about are not representative of
evangelicalism. They’re not representative of conservative
evangelicalism. So I think that’s important to keep in mind.
This
is a movement that is growing in popularity and I think one of the ways
they have been able to do that is they’re not very identifiable to most
people. They’re just presented as nondenominational or just Christian.
But it is an identifiable movement now with an identifiable ideology.
GROSS: Well, I want to thank you so much for talking with us.
Ms. TABACHNICK: Thank you, Terry.
GROSS:
Rachel Tabachnick has been writing about the New Apostolic Reformation
for the website Talk To Action. You’ll find links to her recent articles
on our website, freshair.npr.org.
We invited several
people affiliated with the NAR to join us on FRESH AIR, but they were
unable to do anything in time for today’s broadcast. Mike Bickle has
agreed to join us at a future time. We hope to schedule that soon.
Coming up, rock critic Ken Tucker reviews John Doe’s new album.
This is FRESH AIR.
