Righteous and Wrong: Why Trump's Immigrant policy is Anti-Christian, Cruel, and Doomed

by Nomad

Justifying the Indefensible

When Attorney General Jeff Sessions used a Bible verse to justify separating immigrant children from their families, a milestone in America's march toward a Christian theocracy was reached.

Instead of citing decades of legal precedent, Mr. Sessions quoted Romans 13.

Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.

Later, Press Secretary (and uber-Christian) Sarah Huckabee Sanders  endorsed Sessions by telling the shell-shocked White House news corp “it is very biblical to enforce the law.” And yet, at no place in the Bible does it say that splitting up families or caging children is a particularly Christian thing to do.

Michigan Laws and the Less-Discussed Sins of Sodom

by Nomad

Despite a host of serious problems in the state, the minds of the Republicans in the Michigan Senate were focused on passing a dubious anti-sodomy law. But what is the truth behind the Biblical story of Sodom? Who are the real Sodomites?

Michigan and SB219

With so many things going wrong in that state, you'd think Michigan legislators would have their hands full. You'd think they would have no problem finding serious issues to tackle. 

However, you'd be wildly incorrect.  

Last week, legislators decided that it was much more concerned with the sex practices of its citizens than with those boring issues. The state Senate passed SB 219 that, as one critic says, "effectively reaffirms the state's unconstitutional law making sodomy a felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison."
If the person is already a sex offender, violations are punishable by life in prison. 

Michigan is one of more than a dozen states that still have sodomy bans on the books, despite the U.S. Supreme Court's 2003 ruling in Lawrence v. Texas declaring them unconstitutional.

The Court's decision in the Texas case ruled that intimate consensual sexual conduct was part of the liberty protected by substantive due process under the 14th Amendment. As Wikipedia explains: 

Lawrence invalidated similar laws throughout the United States that criminalized sodomy between consenting adults acting in private, whatever the sex of the participants.

Nobody told the Michigan legislators, it seems.  

While most people see this as primarily directed at gay couples, the laws criminalizing oral and anal sex can apply to both same-sex or different-sex couples. 

   

This law was deceptively attached to laws protecting animals from abuse. It should be mentioned that one progressive blog, Eclectablog, claims that this isn't an anti-sodomy law at all but a law designed to "prohibit convicted animal abusers from adopting another animal for five years." In that case, it is merely a badly-written law. Here's the sentence that has raised objections:

A person who commits the abominable and detestable crime against nature either with mankind or with any animal IS guilty of a felony, punishable by imprisonment for. not more than 15 years

The rather old-fashioned phrase, "the abominable and detestable crime against nature" in this context would certainly be a sexual crime presumably with an animal. In short, the crime of bestiality.

However, lawmakers inexplicably added the phrase "either with mankind or animal" which then changes the meaning to unnatural sexual acts, the classic definition of sodomy. If the state had repealed its old sodomy laws, it would be much easier to dismiss this as just a poorly-written law.

Since 2014, the Republicans in Michigan have held a strong majority in the State House and Senate. They can do whatever they want without much opposition.
Pandering to the Christian Right has now, critics say, devolved into enforcing baby-making sexual practices at a state level. Strictly speaking, every other form of sex could be considered "unnatural." (Even sex using contraceptive is technically unnatural.)

But if sodomy is the thing that really captures the imagination of the Michigan Republicans, then perhaps they should delve a little deeper in the story of the Sodomites and why, according to the Bible, God decided to destroy them.  

Horny Moses: Why Biblical Literalists Really Have Some Explaining to Do

by Nomad

When people say they believe every word of the Bible, they may not know very much about the history of the sacred text they claim as the direct word of God. 

As Moses climbed down from the mountaintop with his ten commandments, the amazed Israelites noticed a great change in his appearance. The question is: did Moses have newly white hair? Or did he had a pair of horns on his forehead?

The answer to that depended on which period of history you lived in. For most of us, it's not a subject we would normally dwell on. But those who claim the Bible is the infallible Word of God, the question presents some thorny problems.

Moses with Horns

Above is a detail photo of a statue from the end of the Middle Ages. This statue of Moses was sculpted by Michelangelo between the years 1513–1515. Today, it sits in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome.

You might see something a bit peculiar if you study the photo closely. Along with his flowing beard and tablets in his arms, the Prophet Moses has a pair of goatish horns on his head.
One could be forgiven for thinking that Michelangelo was shooting at a statue of Lucifer.
But no, that's the Hebrew lawgiver Michelangelo carved.

Conscience and Scripture: How the Abolition of Slavery and the Fight for Marriage Equality are Inseparable 2/2

by Nomad

In the second part of this series, we take a look at how the Presbyterian Assembly's recent decision to recognize marriage equality is entirely in keeping with its history on other progressive issues.
And whether it was slavery, segregation or mixed marriage, the opposition was always ready to use Scripture to justify their prejudices.

In the earlier post on this subject, we looked at the recent break between National Black Church Initiative (NBCI) and the Presbyterian Church over the subject of same-sex marriage. The decision to allow ceremonies to be conducted- as per the conscience of each church- created a backlash, involving approximately 15.7 million African Americans belonging to 34,000 churches. 

Rev. Anthony Evans. President of NBCI claimed that the Presbyterian Assembly had strayed from the Word of God, that is, the Holy book which defines marriage as between a man and a woman.

The History of Going Beyond Scripture

The history of the denomination reveals a centuries old pattern of free thinking. Presbyterianism was especially influenced by the French theologian John Calvin,
Two quotes by Calvin seem especially relevant.

Is it faith to understand nothing, and merely submit your convictions implicitly to the Church?

Clearly he believed that faith was more than submission without understanding.  He argued against relying solely on Scripture to resolve spiritual issues- or still worse, relying on the interpretations of church leaders. Faith shouldn't be a hand-me-down.

Another influence on Presbyterian doctrine was  a Scottish reformer, John Knox. He too objected to the absolute submission to Scripture and he had his reasons. 

The testimony of scripture is so plain that to add anything were superfluous, were it not that the world is almost now come to that blindness, that whatsoever pleases not the princes and the multitude, the same is rejected as doctrine newly forged, and is condemned for heresy.

The Search for Christian Converts

by Nomad

Divorced Michael Reagan: Casting the First Stone at Same-Sex Marriage

Before Michael Reagan launches into a diatribe about the evils of same-sex marriage, he might want to review the Bible's view on divorce. He might not be able to look at himself in the mirror.

Michael Reagan was on Piers Morgan the other night giving (free of charge) his opinions on gay marriage. He said he didn't believe in it. Piers also called upon Reagan to explain his recent op-ed piece in which he equates same-sex marriage to “polygamy, bestiality, and perhaps even murder.”

It's not an original argument, of course. Limbaugh and Beck and Bachmann and so many other lunatics have trotted it out time after time.

In that article, Reagan called upon churches of all denominations to "fight back" unless they were cowards who were "afraid to lose their 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status by engaging in political activity." (A taunt that could prove costly to many violating organizations if the IRS could ever be roused from its slumber.) 

Evangelical Religion’s War on Common Sense

by Nomad

Hostility and Antipathy

During their failed runs for the Republican nomination in this year’s presidential election, GOP candidates such as Gingrich and Santorum, made the shocking claim that Obama was waging a war on religion. That sort of nonsense might play well to the average Fox News watchers who seem to be fully prepared to swallow any anti-Obama rhetoric, no matter how preposterous.

Naturally this meme was picked up by conservative religious leaders, eager to make a name for their crusade against the evils of secularism and the horrors of the separation of Church and State.

As Mother Jones reports:

Gary Marx, the executive director of Ralph Reed's Faith and Freedom Coalition, sent out a fundraising letter this month urging people to sign a petition fighting Obama's "war on religion," writing: "The Obama Administration's actions are evidence of a pattern of hostility towards religious institutions and an antipathy to uphold and protect the nation's most fundamental founding principles."

Despite showing precious little in the way of evidence of Obama's hostility, apart from not taking orders from the Church, people like Marx are allowed to promote this claim without anybody challenging them. 

Faith in Politics Exposed: Controversial but Necessary Questions for the Presidential Candidates

by Nomad

Here's an excerpt from an NPR article, entitled "Has Obama Waged War on Religion?"

Newt Gingrich warns the U.S. is becoming a secular country, which would be a "nightmare." Rick Santorum says there's a clash between "man's laws and God's laws."

Religious conservatives see an escalating war with the Obama White House. One Catholic bishop called it "the most secularist administration in history." Another bishop says it is an "a-theocracy." Bishop William Lori of Bridgeport, Conn., who heads the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' new Ad Hoc Committee on Religious Liberty, believes the First Amendment is clear: The government cannot make people choose between obeying the law and following their faith.

Whether Newt Gingrich knows it or not, America is NOT becoming a secular state. It is a secular state and has been since its inception. It is in very real danger of becoming a theocratic state and that, many people would say, is the potential “nightmare.”