Soldiers of Christ

[anotheranon]

At last the articles about the Christian Dominionists from last month's Harper's magazine are online:

Inside America's most powerful megachurch

Feeling the hate with the National Religious Broadcasters

Still don't have a good "political" icon, but after reading these articles, I thought the "fear" one quite suitable. Sometimes you just have to take people at their word :(

Seriously - read them.

Comments

[hadesgirl.livejournal.com]

Okay. If you're trying to scare me, it worked.

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Do you see what I mean now when I point out that not all Christians are as cool as you and Mikey are?

[hadesgirl.livejournal.com]

Yup. And they are powerful enough to be very, very frightening.

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I bought that issue of Harpers on the advice of some friends. It's pretty troubling.

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

I may have been one of the friends - if not, I was terribly remiss.

Big question now is what do we DO about it?

[timcharmorbien.livejournal.com]

"Big question now is what do we DO about it?"

About their beliefs, probably nothing. That kind of smug, intolerant, fanatically überAmerican attitude is very difficult to cut through with logic alone. All we can do is try to vote against the measures and political candidates that would give these people the kind of temporal power they crave. I'm actually more immediately concerned that our government's Middle Eastern policy is based in part on the millenial beliefs of people like this, because these folks have NO interest in brokering peace in Israel. As far as they're concerned, the sooner the Palestinians are wiped out the sooner the Temple can be rebuilt, they get the Rapture express to Heaven, leaving us "sinners" to our fiery doom. (Which seems like a curiously unChristian selfishness to me, but these folks are as immune to irony as they are to logic)

I am somewhat heartened to note that not all of the evangelicals out there are pleased by the willful ignorance and intolerance that marks the Dominionist movement. I don't know how helpful that will be, though, considering they share the same obsession with the "End Times". Personaly, I think the inclusion of the book of Revelation in the New Testament was the worst thing that could have happened to Christianity; Jesus was a teacher, not a warrior, and too many "Christians" have forgotten that.

As for political aspirations, I think history has taught again and again that when the church runs the government, the result is NOT a more godly government, but a more corrupt church.

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

I think it's also important that these fanatics be called on their more extreme viewpoints and ambitions. So often the PC enforcement of respect for the religious beliefs of others prevents us saying what NEEDS to be said - that whatever the Dominionists believe privately, they have no right to expect or demand governmental enforcement of their beliefs, or to use the legal system to impose their values on everyone else.

[timcharmorbien.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that is what it all comes down to, doesn't it? They aren't content with holding their beliefs, or the opportunity to offer those beliefs to others, they want to force the rest of us to conform to those beliefs. And they just can't understand that that would end up being just as bad for them as it would be for everyone else. That's why people have to be vigilant about who they're voting for, and not just pick a candidate based on one or two 'hot buttons' like abortion; people like this rely on their hot buttons to keep people from really examining the rest of their ideology.

[wcg.livejournal.com]

what do we DO about it?

Yeah, that's the question. I've been reading about the German resistence movement, der Widerstand. We don't hear much about them, but they were impressive people and deserve credit for helping to bring down the beast by their actions from within. Most of them were very patriotic people who dearly loved their country and hated what had happened to it. A fair number were veterans of WW I, and some were actually serving in the German armed forces even as they worked to thwart the overall plan.

From what I can tell, the core of der Widerstand was made up of people who were what we'd call Liberal Christians. Led by Dietrich Bonhoffer, a Lutheran minister who worked for German military intelligence, they opposed the way that the Nazi's had suborned mainstream Lutheranism in Germany into a very militant kind of movement.

[semmie17.livejournal.com]

Civil War.

It's going to get ugly. :(

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Are you so sure about out and out war? What about your interest in the article that suggested that the right and left might be able to find common cause in moral issues like poverty?

[semmie17.livejournal.com]

I hope for the best and prepare for the worst. The best is that the fundies will understand that dominion is just not acceptable -- "Christian Fascism" is not a selling catchword. The worst is that we will have a Abolitionist-Slave Owners type war because people haven't learned their history lessons. Oklahoma City redux. :::shakes head sadly:::