Lord God Please Deliver Us From The SuperChristians

If you read the papers you’re likely to learn about all kinds of strange outliers and unusual happenings. Amidst what we know for sure is an unending War being waged upon Christianity there will be occasional stories about how Christianity is waging holy war on people who’d rather be left alone.

Slate reports on one such case in Louisiana.

And there's also this story from RawStory.

Some helpful perspective from blogger Zack Hunt.

Here is a little known fact (or maybe a carefully ignored one): Showboat religion actually runs counter to what the Gospels teach. Jesus said pretty clearly that praying loudly in public was wrong besides being annoying and in bad taste. Here's the Bible book and verse on public show prayer.

Still, many Americans believe Christianity is under attack even if all we're doing is asking them forgodssake to just tone it down. The folks on FoxNews keep their alert flasher going about this for hours a week, between wringing their hands about the decline in the military budget which isn’t declining and worrying about the hordes of foreigners who keep coming in adding to the U.S. population which is almost entirely descended from foreigners who came in decades earlier, some of whom weren't even Christian at all...some of whom were even (Unitarians). In some columns the greatest threat to Christianity is the threat to our God-given right to carry machine guns. Other columnists think it’s the liberals trying to feed the poor out of the taxed incomes of rich people who are already worried sick about how unlikely it is that they will ever get into heaven unless it becomes a lot easier to fit camels through the eyes of needles.

But the greatest unifying fear among the writhing, fretful Christians out there is the danger that they will lose their sacred American right to marry someone who’d much rather be married to someone else. They feel it’s wrong that gay men might be allowed to marry other men rather than marrying their sisters or daughters, or that lesbians might marry other lesbians rather than being obligated to enter a sacred union with some good Christian man they feel zero attraction to. This holy right to an unhappy, frustrated and unfulfilling married life seems particularly sacred in the South and in the rural West.

Still the Right Wing columnists seem to think free choice is a bad thing in the land of the free.

The best argument for the superiority of their faith among today’s superChristians (the supercharged variety of Christian that is fully armed and believes in the sanctity of lower wages for working people) is that Christianity makes us better people. That going to church on a weekly basis makes us kinder and gentler and more generous, which is most definitely NOT to say that it makes you Liberal. Apparently, though, churchgoing and praying and feeling closer to God than all the other less devout losers you have to rub shoulders with every day does not, in fact, make people more generous or kinder or gentler. Quite the reverse. Of course this new information isn’t a reliable revelation handed down by some godly preacher in a $5000 suit who received it directly out of the sky. No, it turns out this information comes from scientists who did careful verifiable research on human behavior while they weren’t otherwise busy worshipping Satan.

Here's an article about this latest research from that unholy bastion of godless Communism, the Economist Magazine.

And, if you'll forgive me, some more science news on the topic from the LATimes.

Religion sometimes makes us better, sometimes worse, sometimes stupid. I give you Ben Carson, an interesting example of how a seemingly intelligent and well-educated man can come off looking like a damn fool because he refuses to acknowledge that science might be right.

A Short Film to Share and Talk About

Here's a short film by a friend of mine. Devoted loving couples talking about what makes love and devotion so important to them. Watch it. You have to wonder why anyone could think it's wrong for any of these couples to marry.

Here in Minnesota Republicans have put a constitutional amendment on the ballot that would forever limit marriage to one man and one woman.

They say that allowing gay people to marry might endanger their own marriages, make their marriages "less special". I don't recall Jesus ever saying something was more blessed because other people couldn't have it, or that it was wrong to love and care for another person. How can you oppose love? Isn't that a kind of hatred?

Put it another way: conservative "Christians" and Republicans seem to think everyone has a God given right to marry a gay person, as long as that person is of the opposite sex. Does that make sense to you? Doesn't that sound like a recipe for thousands of dishonest, unhappy marriages, and millions of lonely lives?

Watch the film. Share it. Talk about it. Let's vote down this hateful amendment.

Bradlee Dean Running and Hiding

My letter yesterday was about Bradlee Dean, written and sent before I knew he'd been invited to open the legislature with a prayer. It was a divisive prayer. I'd actually addressed my letter to the local media, who over the past ten years has managed not to cover this hatemongering talk-radio-jock-pastor-rock-drummer or his close ties to the GOP leadership. His "ministry" is called "You Can Run But You Can't Hide."

Running and hiding. This from Politics in Minnesota describes Dean's and the GOP leaders' avoiding the press conference they set up to address the controversy.

The GOP leadership has managed to erase the event from the public record. Can they do that? They did. It never happened. Stop complaining.

Mayor Rybak has a very good response to this eruption of hate politics.

From MNPublius, a good summary of the cozy bed-time Bradlee Dean has spent with Republican leaders over the years.

It made the national and world news too.

Mother Jones. Their midweek article anticipated this uproar nicely. I posted it to local media, but I think a lot of them were caught by surprise. "Who is this guy?" They ought to have read about him by now, if not in the local media that had carefully avoided noticing him.

Bradlee Dean shows that he can run and can actually hide too, for the time being. But he'll be on the radio this afternoon and tomorrow afternoon.

1280AM, the "Patriot"

...where the talk is mostly about taking down the government, avoiding taxes and misquoting the Founders.

Although I am hearing rumors that his program has been cancelled. Maybe he's been hustled to a secret location.

Hate Radio Jock Opens Minnesota Legislature for Republicans

Just after I'd sent my Pasquino letter this morning I heard that this same hatemonger, Bradlee Dean had been invited by MN Republicans to open the legislature with a prayer. I've heard it. It wasn't the usual non-denominational, non-partisan stuff. It wasn't a hate-filled screed like his radio show, but it was very very partisan. It drew an appropriate but very measured response from the Democrats. It deserves a much louder and angrier response from the public.

This next clip is especially good. And it isn't new. Dean was a chum of Tom Emmer's last fall. Did it get him noticed by journalists?

Why, if Rachel Maddow was reporting Dean's creepiness and GOP friendliness in 2010, is he unreported enough to be invited to open the Minnesota legislature. I realize the Dump Bachmann website is a tad partisan. But Maddow does her reporting well.