Defending The Church

I knew it wouldn't take long for religious zealot and lunatic-fringe "Catholic" prattle-head Bill Donohue to respond to the recent revelation that The Pope is implicated in a cover-up of the sexual assault of deaf children.

The rash of stories about priestly sexual abuse in Europe, especially in Ireland and Germany, has put many Catholics on the defensive. They should not be. While sexual molestation of any kind is always indefensible, the politics surrounding this story is also indefensible.

Employers from every walk of life, in both the U.S. and Europe, have long handled cases of alleged sex abuse by employees as an internal matter. Rarely have employers called the cops, and none was required to do so.

I'm guessing Donohue must have been in a coma when females teachers are arrested for sexual assault on their students, as it was highly publicized and was a major topic of discussion within the conservative realm.

Why, for example, are the psychologists and psychiatrists who pledged to "fix" abusers treated so lightly? After all, employers from the corporate world to the Catholic Church were told over and over again that therapy works and to give the offender a second chance.

Indeed, the zeitgeist of the day was that rehabilitation not only works, it is virtuous. That such advice was wildly oversold can now be agreed upon by almost everyone, and that is precisely why it smacks of politics to deny how strongly held the rehabilitative ideal was. Had the Catholic Church simply tossed the offenders out, it would have been branded as heartless.

No. The church would have been seen as taking a very harsh, and moral, stance against the molestation and rape of children. From not only my perspective, but that of a plurality of people within both the religious and secular worlds, but the Catholic church has a rich and storied tradition of protecting those that have sexually assaulted children.

No one is foolish enough to believe that simply having a pedophile recline back on a couch and tell his life story to a psychiatrist is going to prevent this from ever happening again. So to essentially claim that it is the fault of the behavioral sciences field - in essence claiming you were duped into letting these priests to stick around - is further proof that the Catholic Church lacks that ability to take responsibility for their membership.

The hyper-concentration on the Catholic Church is not by accident. The Church preaches an ethic of sexual restraint -- a profoundly countercultural idea -- so when a priest fails, it's tempting to highlight it. Human nature being what it is, that's understandable. But it's also immoral. Quite frankly, if sexual abuse is wrong, it should not matter what the identity of the abuser is. Selective justice is the highest form of injustice.

Donohue, more so in this piece than just about anything else he's ever written or spoke, is basically telling everyone that the Catholic Church should not be put under any type of scrutiny. He wants you to laud the accomplishments of the church, but when it comes to something like sexual abuse, then we aren't supposed to speak of it. But we do, because the church ( and not just Catholics ) set themselves up as institutions of purity and spirituality.

Why is this man defending the molestation and rape of children?

Behavioral Theology

I'll let Petere Sprigg speak for himself before I bring up a point that he really should consider, seeing as how he is so uber-religious.



One of the great religious talking-points, when it comes to abortion that is, is that "God knows you before you are in your mother's womb". Also, "God has a plan for all of us", is something that religious leaders use as a way to insist that our lives are pre-ordained and that God already has our lives mapped out for us in advance.

The preposterous nature of that aside, let's look at this from Sprigg's statement and then apply that to what his God has created.

Sprigg thinks all homosexual behavior should be outlawed. Therefor, every gay and lesbian person in America would be treated as a common criminal. Since God "created everyone in his own image" and that he "knows" and has a "plan" for us, it stands to reason that God knows who will and who won't be born gay or lesbian.

So here's my question to Sprigg - who are you to doubt God's plan and punish his creations for how God intended them to be?

Do They Have Powdered Acid Blow In Through The Central Air System?

There is this old, Holiness Church that still sits across from the building that was once my grade school in rural Hopkins County Kentucky. As a kid in 5th grade, I was spending the weekend with a friend who's family attended there. My friend's grandfather and grandmother were both preachers. The crowd was a bit like the people in this video.



Are these people that easily duped or are they just crazy?

( h/t to Everything Is Terrible )

Prayers Of The Far Right

There's been quite a bit of talk lately about how people are approaching the subject of death in regards to ones ideological opposites or perceieved enemies.

Fringe conservative "pastor" Wiley Drake is openly "praying" for Barack Obama's death. But, he says it's not really saying anything - it's actually God saying this.

No, seriously.

*click image to play audio from Alan Colmes radio program*



Why is this not suprising? It's because conservatives rationale for most of the idiotic things they say and do is that "God" told them to or that they were following the "word of the bible".

Whether Drake's "death prayer" is an isolated incident or not can't be determined as a concrete yes or no answer, but Obama has this uncanny ability to bring out the crazy, religious, zealots by simply being a black man with a funny name that just happened to win the Presidential election by a majority vote.

( h/t: Paddy @ The Political Carnival )

I Kick Ass For The Lord

Ten points to the person who can name that movie quote.

( h/t to Josh James at The Sanity Project )

I've seen some crazy preachers in my day. There's a Holiness Church across the street from my mothers house in rural Western Kentucky where they have marathon blood-boiling shout, shriek, and wail sessions on Friday nights. I'm pretty sure they do the who "dancing with snakes" too.

It's Snakes On A Mutha-Fuckin Pew!!!!



He's not joking either.



Seems that NIGHTLINE caught up with Mr. Bentley not long ago.



So, what's worse? The man who prays on people's ignorance and desire to feel touched by "God", or those that cover-up for his blatant lies?

But then there's the people that "believe". This is part of the evangelical movement ( and religion in genreal ) that I have never been able to understand. People "believing" in something so outrageous that it boarders on science-fiction. They know that The Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and The Tooth Fairy aren't real, but they are willing to believe that God - this invisible man in the sky - has imbued within a select few people the ability to heal.

Yet, in the face of contradictory evidence, people still continue to flock to people like Todd Bentley.

Six Degrees Of Right-Wing Nuttiness

( h/t to Comments From Left Field )

Anyone remember the film Footloose? Here's the real-life version.

The religious-right, and those that identify with them, can take things just a little too far at times. And when you're at a "Christian" school, their rules can be quite draconian. But this is just over-the-top:

A student at a fundamentalist Baptist school that forbids dancing, rock music, hand-holding and kissing will be suspended if he takes his girlfriend to her public high school prom, his principal said.

Despite the warning, 17-year-old Tyler Frost, who has never been to a dance before, said he plans to attend Findlay High School’s prom Saturday.

Frost, a senior at Heritage Christian School in northwest Ohio, agreed to the school’s rules when he signed a statement of cooperation at the beginning of the year, principal Tim England said.

This is an outside-of-school activity and they are wanting to deny this kid from getting his diploma.

Even though those of us free-thinking souls that realize that Rock-N-Roll doesn't make us do the things that the fundamentalist nut-jobs believe it does, this sort of irrational and illogical behavior toward a student who is engaging in an activity off school property is not a random occurance. They honestly believe that their reach extends well beyond their represive walls.

The first thing that popped in my head when I read this was "why the hell would anyone want to attend this school?" Do they have a great basketball team and this kid wanted to play? Are they looked at favorably by certain colleges and he had the chance to get a scholarship?

More to the point, though - what business is it of any school, Christian or other, to have so much control over their students that they think they can tell them what is acceptable at home, where they work, or even attending events at another school.

I'm certain that Tyler's desire to attend school at the overly watchful Heritage Christian reflects on his character. I'm going to assume that he wasn't going to daterape his girlfriend after the prom. Most "Christian kids" I grew up around tend to not dive off the deep end until people like the administration at Heritage deside they have the right to control every aspect off the lives of those that attend their school.

And it should be pointed out that Heritage, as well as principal Tim England, are part and parcel of the school of thought that brought us the out-pf-wedlock-teenage-pregnancy of Bristol Palin.

God's Definition Of Love

The Westboro Baptist Church is a fascinating lot.

They encompass the most fringe stereotypes that the Right has of the Left, and vice-versa, and blends them together in seemless, choreographed, movements complete with picket-sign slogans.

You'll likely find them at many funerals for soldiers. But recently, they were at the White House shouting about Jack van Impe's favorite subject - The Anti-Christ and the end of the world.

Various videos can be found at Campus Progress, but this one stood out:



It's a classic example of many of the hypocritical theorums within the radical, fundamentalist-religious, movement. The cheif of which is indoctrication.

And this, from my perspective, seems to be what seperates progressives from the Right-Wing within society. It is an example that is manifested at its most lunatic-fringe height.

Buy strict definition, progress means to learn from your mistakes and grow. The Right, and their conservative ideoloy, tend not to learn from mistakes, but would rather ignore those missteps and cast aspersion on those that they disagree with.

What are the people within the WBC attempting to do - aside from offend people from both sides of the aisle?

The two young ladies in the video are examples of ignorance run amok. And they are more than willing to display that same ignorance as if it were divine scripture.

How do people get to such a point?

The one thing that gets me is when I hear people say this - what if they are right?

Yeah, That Church

And you thought the Westboro mob would miss a fantastic chance to look like dithering idiots? Oh, how wrong you were.



So, let's recap.

- Obama says "sodomy I OK" and he's going to "teach us how to fornicate"

- According to some signs, God "hates" the world and America - which includes the Westboro crew, they just haven't figured that out yet.

- Obama's horns are bigger than The Popes and The Devil looks just like the dragon from that movie with Dennis Quaid, and probably talks like Sean Connery.

- God, more than likely, is a Phillies fan

- Job creation is the new Gay

The Craziest "Preacher" On Earth

I don't even think Sean Hannity is crazy enough to bring this guy on his programs.



If you're wondering what else this guy does, you can check out his church website.

Not only does he think that Obama, Wright, and Oprah are "teh Gays", he thinks carrots can sure cancer.3


UPDATE!!!

Turns out Pastor Manning was on Hannity and Colmes, and Hannity he defended Obama?



Actually, Hannity just didn't want someone else sneaking in and taking over his territory. He thinks he should have a monopoly on lying about Obama.