“By far the most important event in the entire rise of Christianity was the meeting in Jerusalem in around the year 50, when Paul was granted the authority to convert Gentiles without them also becoming observant Jews.”

So wrote Rodney Stark, the Distinguished Professor of the Social Sciences and co-director of the Institute for Studies of Religion at Baylor University. His most recent book is “The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion” ($27.99, HarperCollins).

For Christians in particular, I recommend it if only because so many have a tenuous grasp of Christianity’s real history, as opposed the versions that too often are casually accepted as truth.

The truth is that the rise of Christianity is one of the most extraordinary stories of the past two millennia. Stark not only has the knowledge of his vast subject, but he writes with such felicity that it is hard to put the 500-page book aside for both its revelations and its devotion to the facts.

Despite the fact we live in a society that has at most only 4% who self-describe themselves as atheists, the more active among them have the audacity to demand that Christmas be banished to the privacy of homes or the pews and pulpits of churches. They rebuke religion in general as the source of conflict and wars, but ignore the spiritual support and ethical lessons that Christianity provides along with its promise of salvation.

While Judaism was the bedrock of morality and faith that gave it birth, Christianity made it more accessible and significantly includes the Torah as part of its liturgy.

To ignore the rise of Christianity is to be ignorant of an essential element of Western history. Likewise, to ignore the threat of Islam whose beginning is usually dated around 622 CE and which exploded following Mohammad’s death in 632 CE is to ignore the greatest threat to civilization, past and present. Less a religion than a battle plan for world conquest, Islam preaches death to all “unbelievers.” Take heed!

Stark provides a summation to his book and, even so, I shall select only parts of it in the interest of brevity.

“The first generation of the Jesus Movement consisted of a tiny and fearful minority” of a religion, Judaism, that had already been around for a thousand years or more before the assertion was made that the messiah had come and was a crucified Galilean rabbi who mainly and briefly preached in that area of Israel.

“The mission to the Jews was quite successful: large numbers of Jews in the Diasporan communities outside of Palestine did convert to Christianity.” The Diaspora were the Jewish communities in the Middle East and throughout the Mediterranean nations, including Rome, living in places where pagan faiths were dominant.

“Christianity was not a religion based on the slaves and lowest classes of Romans, but was particularly attractive to the privileged.” Moreover, in its earliest years, women often played important roles. Contrary to popular belief, however, “Paganism was not quickly stamped out, but disappeared very slowly.” Paganism involved the worship of multiple gods as well as a belief in magic.

Despite impressive cathedrals, in medieval times church worship among Christians was largely ignored and, as often as not, the clergy were ill-informed about the faith and sometimes not even baptized.

Despite what is said of the Crusades, they were a campaign to reclaim the holy land from Muslims who had conquered it and they were led by men who knowingly bankrupted themselves and often died in this cause. Though Christianity had been widely observed in the East, the armies of Islam destroyed all but remnants, thus shifting its survival to Europe in the West.

“Science arose only in the West because efforts to formulate and discover laws of nature only made sense if one believed in a rational creator.” Even the misnamed “Dark Ages” were actually times of technological development. Likewise historians have determined that the Spanish Inquisition was “a quite temperate body that was responsible for very few deaths and saved a great many lives by opposing the witch hunts that swept through the rest of Europe.”

Perhaps the greatest surprise was the damage done by Constantine who, having made it the religion of his empire, gave rise to an indolent and hypocritical Church hierarchy initially composed of Roman aristocracy. It fostered a clergy who were ignorant of the faith and indifferent to its mission. Not until the Reformation was competition introduced, forcing the Church to return to piety, as various Protestant sects emerged, and energized Christianity in the process.

Stark concludes that “The claim that religion must soon disappear as the world becomes more modern is nothing but wishful thinking on the part of academic atheists. Religion is thriving, perhaps as never before. More than forty percent of the people on Earth today are Christians and their number is growing more rapidly than that of any other major faith.”

And that, as they say, is the good news.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

 

WesternFront America

There’s a woman who lives near me with a personalized license plate that proclaims she’s a WICCAN. If her idea of theology is a penetrating discussion with a pecan tree and she wants to proclaim her lasting commitment to cellulose; that’s her right. Even though the sentiment appears on a plate issued by the Commonwealth.

She’s joined by motorists displaying plates with DRUID, PAGAN and even VEGAN.

Although the thought processes behind the adoption of these belief systems are opaque to me — much like the decision to go out and get a tattoo — knowing religion–oriented plates are out there is not disturbing.

However, one can’t say that for atheists who are very easily disturbed. Evidently their dedication to their lack of faith is so fragile that exposure to slightest whiff of Christianity has the potential to propel them backwards into darkness and superstition. The next thing you know they’re eating Wednesday night dinner in a Baptist Fellowship Hall and wondering why there are never any salt shakers on the table.

Atheists and the separation–of–church–and–state crowd are busy banning Bibles in schools, crosses from Utah roadsides and the phrase “God bless you” from funerals in a Houston VA cemetery. Consequently, they aren’t focused on license plates, but I have a feeling it’s on a To–Do list.

Readers who rely on the news media for their Constitution instruction may not know this, but the document is not actively anti–religion. The founders were believers and the thought of banning government from even the most glancing connection with God would have seemed absurd to them.

The Constitution only prohibits the establishment of a state religion, for example: Emperor worship during the Roman Empire or the Anglican Church in England under Henry VIII.

The phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the Constitution. This atheist catchphrase originated in a private letter written by Thomas Jefferson and has no more force of law than this column.

And Jefferson, bless his heart, had his idiosyncrasies. Acting as the Gutenberg of the scissors and a paste–pot set, Jefferson produced his own Bible by literally cutting out the parts he didn’t like and keeping what he did.

This may make him the first Unitarian Universalist and would probably qualify Jefferson to be ordained as an Episcopal bishop, but it does not make him a reliable source on the religious views of the founders.

For the sake of argument, let’s assume the religion scrubbers are correct and the Constitution justifies purging all trace of worship from the public square. The question is what type of government do they think will result?

A cool, clean empire of intellect ruled by Mr. Spock? Maybe, but China is more likely.

This would make many progressives very happy, including those in the White House. China is a communist government run by experts. (A two–fer in progressive circles.) These experts don’t get bogged down in partisan gridlock caused by annoying Republicans who smoke. Decisions are made based on science, not politics. Plus, the experts are Asian and everyone knows how smart they are.

China is also rich. And it has bullet trains that fly between major cities. State–sponsored abortion is legal. (You could almost call it human sacrifice, but that sounds too much like religion.) And since there is only one party, there are no messy political campaigns and tacky commercials.

China is everything a secular humanist could wish for, until a toddler gets hit by a truck.

Then you learn the price for removing religion from the public square. 18 different people in Guangzhou watched as a two–year–old girl, who wandered into traffic, was smashed by delivery van. They left her lying bloody in the street until she was run over by a truck. Finally, after seven long minutes, an elderly scrap peddler, who may not have had anything to lose, dragged her out of the street.

People don’t help injured two–year–olds in China because helping others is not state–approved behavior. In 2007 a young man was sued after he helped an elderly woman with a broken leg to the hospital. The Wall Street Journal reports the court ordered the rescuer to pay 40 percent of the woman’s medical bills because “according to common sense” he would not have helped her if he had not been in some way responsible for her fall.

This is social Darwinism as a governing philosophy. Altruism only creates suspicion in a government where religion is banned.

This is why over time the religion haters won’t like the government that results from their efforts. Because when you jettison God you also jettison the Good Samaritan.

Michael R. Shannon is a public relations and advertising consultant with corporate, government and political experience around the globe. He is a dynamic and entertaining keynote speaker. He can be reached at
michael-shannon@comcast.net.

Michael R. Shannon
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WesternFront America

[I]t would be very nice if there were a God who created the world and was a benevolent Providence, … a moral order in the universe and an after-life; but it is a very striking fact that all this is exactly as we are bound to wish it to be. …

~ Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis and, to a great extent, modern psychology and psychiatry, came of age in Vienna in the late 19th century. At that time Vienna, despite its overt anti-Semitism, was a cultural and intellectual haven for Jews. Freud’s biographers aren’t exactly certain what series of events led to his virulent hatred and disregard of all religions (especially Judaism and Christianity), but what we do know is that in many of his most important writings – “Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality” (1905), “Totem and Taboo” (1913), “Civilization and Discontents” (1930) and the book I will critique in this essay, “The Future of an Illusion” (1927) – Freud repeatedly and shamelessly attacks religion as nothing but a grand illusion; psychotic delusions that people who consider themselves to be rational, intelligent and scientific should straightway give up, grow up and admit “man’s insignificance or impotence in the face of the universe.”

Despite his hatred of religion and glorification of sexual perversity, Freud admittedly had many revelatory, thoughtful and profound insights into the deep, dark recesses of the conscious and unconscious mind, which for a century have aided scientists and psychologists to help people understand and resolve real and serious mental and emotional problems. Freud isn’t original in this respect. The Bible, arguably the first psychological treatise (or as Bishop Jakes says, “psychiatry for the poor”), for millennia has already told us about the grotesqueries of human nature, our irrational attraction to evil [sin] in all its innumerable forms and the need for a Redeemer to save humanity from committing suicide against itself.

“The Future of an Illusion” is a naked frontal assault against religion, dismissing it as mere illusion, foolish wish-fulfillment by infantile minds. Freud’s ideas originated in classical philosophy whose intellectual foundation lies squarely in the amoral political atheism of Machiavelli, reaching its philosophical zenith in the writings of Nietzsche. However, Freud provided a novel distinction by presenting atheism as ipso facto true. Rejecting the thought that religion exists because God exists and that human beings therefore have a natural tendency to worship, Freud thought that a more scientific explanation for religion was in order.

Freud first presented his perverse and unscientific theories of the unreality of religion in his 1913 book “Totem and Taboo.” Here Freud’s famous Oedipus Complex theory stated that the source of the religious cult (the origin of culture) was the murder and eating of a father by his sons. The sons killed the father because naturally they desired to have sex with their mother, and their father was a rival. In base primeval fashion, they thought that by eating their father they gained his power and privileges. Over time, this consecrated feast evolved into the institution of religion and its moral prohibition of incest and patricide.

There you have it, in Freud’s Garden of Eden the three branches of humanity’s family tree lay in incest, patricide and cannibalism. Where is Freud’s historical evidence, scientific rigor and substantive psychoanalysis to support these scurrilous charges? There is no evidence. Freud’s immoral anything-goes philosophy was animated by the atheism of Hobbes and Rousseau who glorified Primitive Man, including their entirely phony philosophy of man’s inherently primitive state of nature – particularly Rousseau’s ideas contained in his famous aphorism: “Savages are not evil precisely because they do not know what it is to be good.”

Freud believed that he had demonstrated “the psychical origins of religious ideas” in “the terrifying …helplessness in childhood [that] aroused the need for protection – for protection through love – which was provided by the father,” and that religious ideas are therefore “illusions, fulfillments of the oldest, strongest, and most urgent wishes of mankind.”

Freud’s solutions are even more ghastly and unconscionable than his subjective rants, which he falsely presents as reasoned, dispassionate psychoanalysis in his books. The rational thing to do, Freud argues, is to renounce this illusion. Grow up, reject religion and embrace science. Become “irreligious in the truest sense of the word” and admit “man’s insignificance or impotence in the face of the universe.”

One cannot help reading Freud’s anti-Judaism and anti-Christian diatribes in his book “The Future of an Illusion” and not think of two things: First, by attacking religion in such a personally virulent way Freud lacks all objective or scientific credibility and makes himself a victim of his own perverse ideas, namely psychological displacement, which is a psychosis and defense mechanism invented by Freud himself whereby one ascribes his own evil intent or psychopathy to one’s enemies.

Secondly, although much of Freud’s psychoanalytic theories have been ruled fraudulent, unsustainable and untrue by modern science and psychiatric literature and scholarship, nevertheless Freud’s maniacal atheism and hatred of religion, history, hierarchy and moral traditions have been wholly adopted by modern-day liberals, progressives and socialists, into whose education atheism has been infused not only in every aspect of public and private education curriculum and the academy, but also Freud’s legacy is found permeated throughout American politics, law, popular culture and society.

For example, progressives, the Democratic Party, President Obama and his administration have been zealous advocates of taking Freud’s perverse legacy to brand new nihilistic ends. How else could one explain contemporary social policies like abortion on demand, same-sex marriage, the homosexual and LGBT revolution, the radical feminist movement, support of Occupy Wall Street protesters and the modern amoral trends to exposing our children to greater and more extreme forms of psychopathy and psychosexual depravity?

Assuming Freud was mentally unimpaired, nevertheless he engaged in many impulsive, perverse behaviors and zealously promoted self-defeating, amoral acts upon society in the name of substantive medical discovery and legitimate scientific inquiry. A hundred years before Freud, French physician Philippe Penel perhaps would have diagnosed Freud as la folie raisonnante (“insane without delirium”), meaning one fully understood the irrationality of his behavior but continued with it anyway.

Thanks, Sigmund Freud!

© Ellis Washington

Ellis Washington is a former editor of the Michigan Law Review and law clerk at The Rutherford Institute. He is an instructor at Spring Arbor University, the American College of Education, and the National Paralegal College. Washington is a co-host on “Joshua’s Trial, a radio show of Christian conservative thought. He is a graduate of John Marshall Law School and has written extensively on constitutional law, history, politics, philosophy, critical race theory and other subjects. His latest book is “The Nuremberg Trials: Last Tragedy of the Holocaust” (2008) and law review article, “Natural Law Considerations of Juvenile Law” (2010). Visit his website, Ellis Washington Report.

 

WesternFront America

This Christmas brings another “can’t we all just get along“ story that once again demonstrating how the media fails to understand committed Christians.

According to the Washington Post, the Higher Education Research Institute found Catholic colleges had a higher percentage of Muslim students than the average secular four–year school.

In typical MSM tail–wags–dog fashion the story is written from the perspective of two Muslim students attending Catholic University in Northeast Washington: A female from Saudi Arabia and a male from Iran.

The students are exposed to, “a life–size painting of Jesus carrying the cross…every classroom is adorned with a crucifix…Professors often open their classes with an appeal to Jesus.” The female student was even required to buy a Bible for a class on the Old Testament! (A book she will have to discard when she returns home, since Bibles are not allowed inside Islamic–ruled Saudi Arabia).

So where’s the story? It’s not like the Muslims are attending Unitarian University. There it would be a big surprise to find crosses, appeals to Jesus and a focus on Christianity, but it’s hardly news to discover Catholics at a university named for the faith.

Instead the reason for the coverage is in the observation, “The influx has astonished and sometimes befuddled administrators. Some Catholic campuses are creating prayer rooms for new Muslim students and hiring Islamic chaplains to minister to them. Others are unsure of how to adapt.”

From the reporter’s viewpoint, hiring Muslim chaplains at a Catholic university is a good thing: One pre–modern superstition accommodating another. What could be better? Unless, of course, some fanatic wants an Ishmael and the manger scene on the quad at Christmas.

But from a genuine Catholic point of view, “adapting” and creating a Muslim prayer room is a betrayal of 2,000 years of the faith. Why would a real Catholic university, confident in the truth of Christianity, encourage students to engage in error?

According to the ACCU, 58 percent of incoming freshmen at Catholic schools identify as Catholic — meaning over 40 percent are from other denominations. Yet, I know of no Baptist chaplains at Catholic colleges and we are much closer theologically than Islam.

Baptist–Catholic differences are doctrinal. For example, we prefer potential converts be old enough to get to the Baptismal under their own power and the conversion experience contain more moisture than is imparted by your average sneeze. And we hold to “sola scriptura,” the belief that the Bible contains all the knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness.

But when it comes to dogma, the set of principles incontrovertibly true, Catholics and Baptists walk side–by–side.

Islam, on the other hand, isn’t even in the ballpark. To mention but a few differences, Jesus is not divine, did not die on the cross and is not the path to salvation. The Golden Rule only applies to other Muslims, not mankind. And there is no Holy Spirit and people who believe that are polytheists.

Compared to that gulf in theology, the average Baptist minister is qualified to be a cardinal.

‘Catholic’ schools that enable Muslim students are what the faithful refer to as Catholic In Name Only, like Holy Cross in Massachusetts. This is a school with an association of Bisexuals, Gays and Lesbians. It allowed a conference that invited Planned Parenthood and NARAL. So naturally it founded MECCA: the Muslim Endeavor to Create Cultural Awareness.

I wouldn’t be surprised to learn ‘WICCA’ was also in the planning stages at this school that has obviously lost its way.

The students profiled choose Catholic University because, “there is something powerful here because people are thinking about God all the time and not just about their own life or studies.” An admirable outlook, making them a prime audience for what a Catholic school should be in the business of doing: exposure and conversion to Christianity. Encouraging the practice of Islam, as the media would have it do, betrays the Great Commission.

When the Apostle Paul addressed the pagans in Athens, some of whom worshiped an idol to the “unknown god.” His message was not “let’s form an Association of Students of the Unknown God!” Paul believed, acted on that belief and invited the audience to join him in worshiping Christ.

These students know in their hearts there is a Creator and they are yearning to be closer to Him. A Catholic university’s mission is to demonstrate through words and actions that the way to realize that goal is through Christ.

Otherwise the school is just another theologically unmoored, formerly religious institution that has succumbed to the secular world and it’s philosophy of the Great Permission.

Michael R. Shannon is a public relations and advertising consultant with corporate, government and political experience around the globe. He’s a dynamic and entertaining speaker and can be reached at michael–shannon@comcast.net.

 

WesternFront America

By Selwyn Duke

When writing about Barack Obama’s religious orientation recently, I pointed out that while I do believe he favors Muslim over Western culture, bowing before another — even God — is above his humility grade. I further mentioned that in keeping with this self-centeredness, Obama is (like all leftists) someone who denies moral reality.

Ironically, after penning my piece, I became aware of an interview Obama once gave — one quite relevant to the topic at hand. It was conducted in 2004 by Chicago Sun Times religion reporter Cathleen Falsani while Obama was running for the U.S. Senate, and it offers great insight into the nature of Obama’s “faith.” I think you’ll be interested to hear what he had to say.

The whole interview is infused with typical leftist philoso-babble. Obama says he’s “a big believer in tolerance” and thus looks askance at “certainty” and believes in the necessity “doubt” (an attitude mysteriously absent when pushing health care), bringing to mind G.K. Chesterton’s observation, “Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.” Yet Obama also told Falsani that he had “deep faith.” This might cause some to wonder “In what?” And this brings us to the part of the interview in which he was asked “What is sin?” Here was his answer:

“Being out of alignment with my values.”

Perhaps this question was also above Obama’s pay grade, or maybe he studied divinity with Al Gore. Whatever the case, this is not the definition of sin. Rather, sin is when you violate God’s laws, or, to put it in more modernistic terms, it’s being out of alignment with God’s values (which are the Truth). So it was an interesting answer. Some might conclude that if you define sin as being out of alignment with your values, you believe you are God.

An even stranger answer came earlier in the interview. In response to Falsani’s query about whether he prayed often, Obama said, “Uh, yeah, I guess I do. It’s not formal, me getting on my knees. I think I have an ongoing conversation with God. I think throughout the day, I’m constantly asking myself questions about what I’m doing, why am I doing it [emphasis mine].”

Did everyone catch that? If I pray to God, I may ask Him questions. I won’t say that I have “an ongoing conversation with God” and then reflexively follow up with “I’m constantly asking myself questions . . . .”

That is, unless I believe I am God.

Now, do I say that Obama thinks he is a supreme being who created the Universe? Unless it’s a universe of programs, laws, regulations and debt, no. But I am certain (if it’s still legal to be so) that Obama is a typical leftist: self-centered and solipsistic. He has deified himself, in the sense that he believes he is above everyone else. This is why he, showing no doubt whatsoever, feels so sure about reshaping our world in his own image.

His comments also vindicate my assessment of him as a moral relativist. Whenever you hear “my values,” know that it’s the language of relativism. It’s the belief that, hey, you have your values, I have mine — you say “potato” and I say “potahto” — and it’s all just a matter of perspective. This is contrary to any absolutist faith, such as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. They teach that God has determined right and wrong and that it is something eternal and unchanging, encapsulated in a word leftists avoid: Truth.

Understand that “values” itself is a term of relativism. Mother Teresa had values, but so did Adolf Hitler; values aren’t good by definition — virtues are. This is why the latter term is hardly uttered in today’s if-it-feels-good-do-it culture; instead, people may boast about how they have values, which is much like a street pusher defending his trade by saying that he provides drugs (which can cure or kill). A value can be sinful as well as sublime.

But in the leftists’ universe there is no sin. After all, they believe as ancient Greek philosopher Protagoras did that “Man is the measure of all things.” However, if this is so, what is what we call right and wrong? It then can be nothing but opinion. But think about the implications of this: If that unchanging and eternal thing called Truth didn’t exist, “morality” couldn’t have any basis in reality. And this would mean that right and wrong doesn’t exist at all. Ergo, no sin.

Unfortunately for Obama’s opponents, however, this insight into his un-faith won’t lose him many votes. This is because he has a lot of company, as moral relativism is the characteristic spiritual disease of our time. And this is why I will use this opportunity as, to quote our relativist-in-chief, a “teachable” moment.

A poll in recent years found that, strikingly, 62 percent of those identifying as Christians didn’t believe in Absolute Truth. I’ll also note that we have seen a great number of articles lately about how Christian youth leave the Church as they move through college. These two factors are not unrelated.

On a simple level, if there’s no Truth — if virtues are just values and values are just opinion — why pick up your cross and carry it? Why embrace a faith that places moral constraints upon you (especially the sexual variety, which interferes with moderns’ favorite recreation)? “If it feels good, do it” then makes more sense.

Delving a bit deeper, relativism strikes at the foundational act of Christianity: the sacrifice at Calvary. After all, if right and wrong are just opinion and there is thus no sin, there was no reason for Jesus to die on the cross, was there? (But He never said that His blood would be shed for you and for all so that opinions may be forgiven.) So if you haven’t instilled your children with a belief in Truth, don’t be surprised when they leave the Church. If they don’t believe in sin, they cannot believe in a savior.

But this doesn’t mean they won’t desire salvation — that is, at least the worldly variety. And this is one reason why millions of Americans, especially the ever-more-relativistic young, voted for The One. A people who believed in Truth would never cast such a vote — and those who do believe in it generally didn’t — but when man doesn’t believe in God, he makes man God. As to why, I explored the reasons in The New American magazine in 2009, writing:

Among other things, people find a belief in God comforting. It involves the ideas that God, or good, will always triumph in the end; that someone is watching over them, cares for them, will help them, and will be there for them in the end. Now, since this human need doesn’t disappear along with faith, it follows that people will replace God with something else when they lose faith in Him. Thus did millions of Germans cheer Hitler believing he represented security, triumph, economic resurrection, hope, and change. And it isn’t surprising that he rose during the desperate days of the Weimar Republic, with its hyper-inflation and hypo-industriousness. It is when people are desperate that they search for a savior; when they are brought to their lowest, they have nowhere to look but up. It is then that they find either the Deity or a demagogue. And when you mistake the latter for the former, the danger is profound. For you don’t disobey a god, you don’t question him; a god is infallible. A prostrate people will follow a messianic leader to the ends of the Earth even if it takes them to the edges of Hell.
. . . Someone who would accept any degree of deification is not only unfit to be worshipped as a god, he is unfit to be followed as a leader. As G.K. Chesterton said in his classic work The Everlasting Man, “A great man knows he is not God, and the greater he is the better he knows it…. Nobody can imagine Aristotle claiming to be the father of gods and men, come down from the sky; though we might imagine some insane Roman Emperor like Caligula claiming it for him, or more probably for himself.” It is also correct to say that truly great people know that their leaders aren’t God, and the greater they are, the better they know it.
So, ultimately, the warning here isn’t about Barack Obama. It is about us. Our tendency to make man into God will always be directly proportional to our tendency to make God into myth.

Thank God, the myth of Obama has finally been punctured in the minds of many. As with the Daniel Dravot character (played by Sean Connery) in “The Man Who Would be King,” the natives have now seen Obama bleed, and they’re not happy. He is bleeding America, and he won’t stop until somebody (hopefully the Republicans starting January) stops him. After all, why would he listen to the people or compromise with anyone? Despite his extolling of uncertainty, when he has his “ongoing conversation with God” and is asking himself questions, I tend to think he views the answers as most infallible, indeed.

Selwyn Duke is a writer, columnist and public speaker whose work has been published widely online and in print, on both the local and national levels. He has been featured on the Rush Limbaugh Show and has been a regular guest on the award-winning Michael Savage Show. His work has appeared in Pat Buchanan’s magazine The American Conservative and he writes regularly for The New American and Christian Music Perspective.  He is a regular contributor to Ether Zone.
Selwyn Duke can be reached at: SelwynDuke@optonline.net

“Published originally at EtherZone.com

 

WesternFront America

By Bill Warner

One of the most common arguments of the supporters of the Ground Zero mosque includes religious freedom as guaranteed by the First Amendment. Religion is seen as the framework to support building a mosque and community center near the site of the former World Trade Towers. Is this really about religion? Step back and look at the controversy. Do you feel like you are taking part in a religious exercise or a political fracas?

There is a vast confusion about what a religion is and is not. Currently the operative rule is that anything associated with Islam is a religious affair where all of the freedom of religion is applied to the action or event. Islam’s actions are religious and if you oppose it, you are an un-American bigot.

It is time to stop and take a look at what we mean by a religion. There are about as many Buddhists in America today as there are Muslims. When was the last time you remember a Buddhist demand of any kind? Do Buddhists set up councils to shape the textbooks and demand Buddhist finance? Does the government make a big announcement when Buddhists are appointed to high posts? Are there even any Buddhists in any White House appointments? Do Buddhists complain? Never, for these are political actions, and Buddhism has almost no political outreach. Buddhism in America is purely religious, not political at all.

Yet the media and the Internet are consumed by talk and argument about Islam. The discussion is never about how many rounds of prayer to do or whether a certain food is halal (religiously proper). No, the focus is always on something that non-Muslims are to do to accommodate an Islamic religious practice.

There is a practical working definition of religion as compared to politics. Religious practices are done by those who follow that religion and are motivated for achieving paradise and avoiding hell. Outsiders are not involved in those religious acts. If it is about going to heaven and avoiding hell, then it is religious. However, if the religion makes a demand on those outside of its own group, then that demand is political.

Most people think that the Koran is a religious text. Instead, 64% of the text (by word count) is about non-Muslims, who are called Kafirs. The Koran is fixated on Kafirs and makes many demands on them. Not the least is that Kafirs submit to the rule of Islamic Sharia law. Ultimately Sharia law is the pure expression of Islamic politics and it completely contradicts our Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Under Sharia there is no freedom of speech, wives may be beaten and apostates murdered.

Mohammed had little success with Islam until he transformed it into a political system. He preached the religion of Islam in Mecca for 13 years and made about 150 converts. He left Mecca and moved to Medina. In Medina he turned to politics and jihad. In the last 9 years of his life, Mohammed was involved in an event of violence on the average of every 6 weeks. The political method persuaded every Arab to convert to Islam. The religion did not succeed; it was politics that made Islam powerful.

Bill Warner,
Director, Center for the Study of Political Islam
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WesternFront America

Gnostic [liberal] politics is self-defeating in so far as its disregard for the structure of reality leads to continuous warfare.

~ Eric Voegelin

I am astounded by the connections of modern liberalism and first-century Gnosticism – arguably the most subtle, diabolical and enduring heresy of the New Testament church. Dr. Benjamin Wiker, in his latest opus, “10 Books Every Conservative Must Read,” writing on Eric Voegelin’s great work, “The New Science of Politics” (1952), stated:

Voegelin argues that we cannot properly understand the epically destructive character of 20th–century utopianism unless we understand the nature of a particular, ancient Christian heresy, Gnosticism. For Voegelin, Gnosticism defines the nature of modernity, or, more exactly, of a particular virulent and destructive strain of modern thought, a strain that includes liberalism, Marxism and National Socialism.

In his “Ryrie Study Bible” (1978), the great theologian Dr. Charles Ryrie had this important note on Gnosticism and its place in biblical history:

The heresy of Gnosticism had begun to make inroads among churches in John’s day. Among its teachings were: 1) knowledge is superior to virtue; 2) the nonliteral sense of Scripture is correct and can be understood only by a select few; 3) evil in the world precludes God’s being the only Creator; 4) the incarnation is incredible because deity cannot unite itself with anything material such as a body (Docetism); and 5) there is no resurrection of the flesh. The ethical standards of many Gnostics were low, so John emphasized the reality of the incarnation and the high ethical standard of the earthly life of Christ.

Doesn’t the ancient cult of Gnosticism, which systematically sought to pervert and denigrate Christianity, sound strangely similar to modern political liberalism, which, since the Enlightenment Age, systematically sought to pervert and eliminate Christianity from the marketplace of ideas?

Regarding American liberalism, pick any utopian socialist – from Woodrow Wilson, FDR, LBJ, Clinton, Carter, Obama, to the useful idiots of atheism, feminism, gay rights, civil-rights activists, the labor and teachers’ unions – and you will find a person who thinks his knowledge base (politics) is superior to virtue; that the Bible is a collection of myths that isn’t to be taken literally; that moral relativism holds that all religions lead to “god” and that no religion is better (or worse) than any other; that separation of church and state is the singular dogma of liberalism; that there are no miracles, God or need for a savior. The State is god, and god is the State. The state under socialism will give everyone heaven (utopia) on earth through cradle-to-grave care. Private property, liberty and independent man are all relics of a bygone era.

How can you counter the liberal corrosion that has filtered into every issue affecting our daily lives? Find out in Mark Levin’s “Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto”

Jeffrey Nelson, a student of Russell Kirk (author of “The Conservative Mind”), writing on Voegelin’s profound contributions to political philosophy, remarked that Voegelin saw communism and its related political philosophies – liberalism, progressivism, fascism and socialism – as only the latest of man’s efforts to “shortcut” heaven and have it on earth. “Voegelin argued that one of the defining marks of modernity was the increasingly popular view that politics was essentially about the pursuit of secular salvation.”

This connects to the modern Gnostic idea to empower this world with all the essentials that orthodox Christianity held to be possible only in the next world, or what Voegelin refers to the “redivinization” of the political area, which suggests characterizing the state as a substitute divinity.

During the Age of Enlightenment, it was Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza and Rousseau who advocated the subordination of religion to the aims of the secular state, while later philosophers like Comte, Marx and Nietzsche willfully called for the elimination of religion and the divinization of man.

Since nature abhors a vacuum, what would replace Western civilization’s Judeo-Christian worldview? The philosophers, humanists and atheists of the Enlightenment Age presented a new science – secular science – that would bring now what Christianity could only promise in the afterlife. Voegelin believed that the secularists rejected religion but redivinized politics, which justified the creation of a totalizing, omnipotent, secular state, or what Hobbes called Leviathan – the supposed provider of all good things and the professed destroyer of every evil vestige of antiquity, especially organized religion. Such is the terrible monster of the modern dictatorship and why liberalism leads naturally to tyranny.

Wiker said, “For Voegelin, then, liberalism is part of this Gnostic rebellion against Christianity, or, more accurately, an heretical simplification of it. It offers a fundamentally materialistic view of humanity, where man can be led to a technological utopia administered by an ever-more-powerful and centralized government.”

From antiquity the cult of Gnosticism, like Marxism, liberalism and progressivism in modern times, is a form of thinking that claims complete cognitive control of reality. Relying as it does on claims to gnosis – the idea that disorder in the world can be transcended by progressive insight, education or understanding, Gnosticism therefore believes its knowledge to be beyond any criticism.

Following the continuum from the ancient cult of Gnosticism, to humanism and secular liberalism formed during the Enlightenment, to the 20th–century Progressive Movement, to postmodern times under President Barack Obama, we are faced with the fact that Obama is the embodiment of the Gnostic heresy.

Yes, Obama sat in the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s church for 20 years soaking up racist Black Liberation Theology. Yes, Obama claims to be a Christian, yet his socialist policies over the past 18 months have done more to undermine Christianity and every aspect of American exceptionalism than did the three former fascist presidencies of Woodrow Wilson, FDR and LBJ. Yes, Obama arrogantly intoned: “We are the ones we’ve been waiting for” and “I want to fundamentally transform America.”

All Americans of goodwill should join Voegelin’s fight against political tyranny, for it was he who 80 years ago exposed communism as the new “secular salvation; the latest of man’s attempt to shortcut heaven and have it on earth.” Let us today apply Voegelin’s brilliant intellect and strategies to defeat Obama’s progressivism, whose dystopia, alienation, anti-constitutionalism and legalized thievery has already brought a measure of heaven to hell in America.

© Ellis Washington

Ellis Washington is former editor of the Michigan Law Review and law clerk at The Rutherford Institute. He hosts a radio program Thursdays at 11 a.m. Eastern on 1620 AM in Atlanta. It can be heard online at the Radio Sandy Springs website. His weekly podcasts are available Mondays at The Conservative Beacon. Washington is a graduate of John Marshall Law School and a lecturer and freelance writer on constitutional law, legal history and critical race theory. He has written over a dozen law review articles and several books, including “The Inseparability of Law and Morality: The Constitution, Natural Law and the Rule of Law” (2002). Washington’s latest book is “The Nuremberg Trials: Last Tragedy of the Holocaust.”

 

WesternFront America

Until September 11, 2001, most Americans didn’t give a thought to Islam or Muslims. As the years have passed, the truth about that brutal form of government has become a subject of major discussion in this country. While people continue to refer to Islam as a religion, I do not, which is my absolute right under the First Amendment. My personal opinion is that being a Muslim is nothing more than a being a slave to a violent, barbaric form of government which demands everyone must be a Muslim or join all non believers in death.

By declaring Islam a religion, religious leaders in the Middle East and now here in America, control their believers with the threat of some god named Allah. Allegedly, their “holy” Quran was revealed by a man named Muhammad. Many believe Muhammad was a pedophile. I have devoted a great deal of time reading about Islam and Muslims. Nothing I’ve read leads me to believe Muhammad wasn’t a pedophile, he was. One web site in particular seems to be very fair in allowing Muslims and non-Muslims to post their views on Muhammad. One of the links from that site led me to this one:

Child marriage and divorce in Yemen
“After visiting their home and seeing Arwa and her 15-year-old sister, he opted for the younger child. Abdul Ali says the man promised he would wait for the girl to reach puberty before calling her to his house but then changed his mind and came to live with them. So why did he sell his daughter to a stranger? “He gave me 30,000 rial ($150, £90) and promised another 400,000 ($2,000). I was really in need of money and thought it was a solution for the family,” he explains.
“For seven months, Arwa’s husband shared the small room where the family eat, play and sleep. When Arwa fought off his advances, she was beaten. The torment only came to an end when her husband and father quarrelled and Abdul Ali gave her permission to seek outside help. At this point in the narrative, she finds her voice again, describing how she went looking for a neighbour who could lend her money for the journey to court where the judge took pity on her and granted her freedom. A medical examination showed that she had been sexually molested but was still technically a virgin….
“A third girl, Reem is still waiting for the court’s decision and says her two ambitions are to get a divorce and go to college. Married at 12, she describes the moment when her 30-year-old husband insisted on sex. When she resisted, he choked and bit her and dragged her by the hair, overwhelming her with force.”

Americans support such a putrid culture by being raped in taxes:
“Defense relations between Yemen and the United States are improving rapidly, with the resumption of International Military Education and Training assistance and the transfer of military equipment and spare parts. In FY 2009 U.S. Foreign Military Financing (FMF) for Yemen was $2.8 million, International Military Education and Training (IMET) was $1 million, and Non-Proliferation, Anti-Terrorism, Demining and Related Programs (NADR) was $2.5 million. In FY 2009 Yemen also received $19.8 million in Economic Support Funds (ESF), $11.2 million in development assistance, and $67.1 million in Section 1206 funding.”

No where in the U.S. Constitution does it authorize the Outlaw Congress to steal the fruits of our labor to send to Yemen for any reason. More unpayable debt on our backs with an empty treasury.

Do read the link in footnote three below. That such a sick idea should even be considered under Islamic law merely reinforces my belief about any moral standards of their so called religion:

“The whole issue just shows how clue less men are,” blogger Eman Al Nafjan wrote on her web site. “All this back and forth between sheiks and not one bothers to ask a woman if it’s logical, let alone possible to breastfeed a grown man five fulfilling breast milk meals. “Moreover, the thought of a huge hairy face at a woman’s breast does not evoke motherly or even brotherly feelings. It could go from the grotesque to the erotic but definitely not maternal.” [3]

In Afghanistan where our soldiers are dying to protect poppy fields and a culture that marries children to grown men. This is what American soldiers are dying to protect and defend? A civilization so backward and immoral it makes me sick. While flogging these children for refusing to have sex with dirty old men is illegal, it still goes on because that’s what those men believe is their right.

May 30, 2010. Child Brides Escape Marriage, but Not Lashes.

“Forced into a so-called marriage exchange, where each girl was given to an elderly man in the other’s family, Khadija and Basgol later complained that their husbands beat them when they tried to resist consummating the unions. Dressed as boys, they escaped and got as far as western Herat Province, where their bus was stopped at a checkpoint and they were arrested. Although Herat has shelters for battered and runaway women and girls, the police instead contacted the former warlord, Fazil Ahad Khan, whom Human Rights Commission workers describe as the self-appointed commander and morals enforcer in his district in Ghor Province, and returned the girls to his custody.

“After a kangaroo trial by Mr. Khan and local religious leaders, according to the commission’s report on the episode, the girls were sentenced to 40 lashes each and flogged on Jan. 12. In the video, the mullah, under Mr. Khan’s approving eye, administers the punishment with a leather strap, which he appears to wield with as much force as possible, striking each girl in turn on her legs and buttocks with a loud crack each time. Their heavy red winter chadors are pulled over their heads so only their skirts protect them from the blows.

“The spectators are mostly armed men wearing camouflage uniforms, and at least three of them openly videotape the floggings. No women are present. The mullah, whose name is not known, strikes the girls so hard that at one point he appears to have hurt his wrist and hands the strap to another man.”

If anyone thinks having American troops remain in that country under an illegal invasion (no formal declaration of war by Congress) is going to change their culture, you’re in denial. Let’s not forget the increasing number of “honor killings” here in America. Look what we’ve imported, America.

To be fair, there is an email that went viral of a mass marriage ceremony in Gaza showing tiny, adorable little girls as brides to grown men. It was shocking, but I did some research and believe the photos do not represent the event as so stated on this web site. You can also visit this news story showing another mass wedding several years ago. While we know children are being forced into marriage with adult males in Muslim countries, I believe that was not the case as depicted in the email mentioned. Another email that went viral is titled: Joys of Muslim Women by Nonie Darwish. While Ms. Darwish is an activist, she has publicly stated she did not write it, so please stop sending it to endless mailing lists. If you wish to read her views on being raised a Muslin under Sharia law, you can read her interview here. I highly recommend it.

July 17, 2010. Afghans don’t want foreign troops: Poll

“According to the survey released Friday by the International Council on Security and Development (ICOS) think-tank, 68 percent of Afghans say NATO forces do not protect them, as 75 percent believe foreigners disrespect their religion and traditions, Reuters reported. According to the poll, many believe foreign troops are in Afghanistan for their own benefit, to destroy or occupy the country, or to destroy Islam.”

That is not a new poll result. Our military have illegally occupied that country for nine years and nothing has changed. I’ve got a hundred news items on Afghanistan and it’s the same quagmire the Soviets found themselves before they finally gave up after eight years.

We should all remember the cartoon incident several years ago when those peace loving Muslims went berserk. A Danish newspaper back in 2005 published satirical cartoons of Muhammad and all hell broke loose around the world.

There was absolutely no justification for the violence unleashed by Muslims around the world over a few cartoons. However, it should demonstrate to anyone with their eyes wide open that Islam is not a religion (if you even believe it’s a religion) of peace, but one of authoritarian control over sheep who do what they’re told or else; defending Muhammad using violence is normal for Muslims. It’s been that way with their “religion” for well over one thousand years. According to Islam, if you do not believe the toxic teachings of the Quran, you must die in the name of Allah. If you think I’m kidding, then take a good look at these pictures. They are not photo shopped. Those photos show exactly how much hatred is spewed by Muslims because hate is what their pseudo religion teaches. Every time I hear or read about “moderate” Muslims, I want to gag. There is no moderate if you’re a Muslim. It’s Allah’s way or the highway.

If you haven’t read the book, Londonistan by Melanie Phillips, I strongly suggest you do so because she pulls no punches in proving to anyone who can read how dangerous and destructive Muslims have been to Britain. Her book is a warning to the whole world about Islam and she has been right on point.

It is now and always has been the goal of Muslims to force everyone on this globe to convert to their putrid form of government using religion as the controlling mechanism. No? How about right out of the mouth of a Muslim leader in the United Kingdom?

“You can’t say that Islam is a religion of peace,” Choudary told CBN News. “Because Islam does not mean peace. Islam means submission. So the Muslim is one who submits. There is a place for violence in Islam. There is a place for jihad in Islam.” Choudary is the leader of Islam4UK, a group recently banned in Britain under the country’s counter-terrorism laws. He wants Islamic Sharia law to rule the United Kingdom and is working to make that dream a reality. While Islamic radicals in the United States usually prefer to speak in more moderate tones while in public, masking their true agenda, Choudary has no such inhibitions. He has praised the 9/11 hijackers and has called for the execution of Pope Benedict. He also stirred controversy recently when video emerged of him converting a 10-year-old British boy to Islam.”

One of the best short works on the history of Islam is by Dr. Peter Hammond. I had the pleasure of having dinner with Dr. Hammond in Washington, DC., several years ago along with my dear friend, Gen. Ben Partin. Dr. Hammond knows this issue like few others and his book, Slavery, Terrorism and & Islam, is a must read. Dr. Hammond points out and history clearly backs up his statement:

“What few Westerners understand is that Muslim leaders who call for the overthrow of governments and the establishment of an Islamic superstate controlling all aspects of life, for every person on earth, are not necessarily extremists on the fringe of Islam. Jihad, the subjugation and forcible conversion of all people to Islam and world domination are, in fact, central tenants of Islam. Jihad is the sixth pillar of Islam.”

As Dr. Hammond gives permission to copy reasonable text from his thoroughly researched book, here are a few pages just to give you an idea; click here.
Muslims and their clerical leaders will not stop until they achieve their goals and it will be done with violence here in the United States as has been the case around the world for centuries. Dr. Hammond’s book is pricey on Amazon, but you can order directly from their web site. Please note the cost is R 58, which is the Rand, their currency. Here is a conversion chart; if you have questions you can email them. It is worth the effort.

If you think Dr. Hammond is some sort of bigot, you would be badly mistaken. Go look at this 2:07 second video of what has happened in Sweden now that the Muslim population has grown to 1/4th of the population. If you think this isn’t coming to this country, you’re in denial. The same cancer is oozing across America and a growing threat.

Islam has no place in America in my opinion, which I am entitled to even though you might disagree. Their culture is barbaric and they are trying to shove it down our throats. There is a web site that has horrific pictures of female mutilation of their private parts. I warn you the pictures are ugly. I painstakingly went through the links. One link is to a web site run by a woman who is trying to stop the abuse of women and children under Islam. Unfortunately, she promotes democracy, but perhaps down the line she will learn that form of government is not desired by those who love freedom and liberty. Here is one excerpt:

“A man can marry a girl younger than nine years of age, even if the girl is still a baby being breastfed. A man, however is prohibited from having intercourse with a girl younger than nine, other sexual act such as foreplay, rubbing, kissing and sodomy is allowed. A man having intercourse with a girl younger than nine years of age has not committed a crime, but only an infraction, if the girl is not permanently damaged. If the girl, however, is permanently damaged, the man must provide for her all her life. But this girl will not count as one of the man’s four permanent wives. He also is not permitted to marry the girl’s sister.”

Think cutting young Muslim females only happens in the Middle East? Think again because it’s still happening here in the U.S.
And, you wonder why I find their “religion” so repugnant?

I highly encourage you to read this interview, by a Danish Psychologist: ‘Integration of Muslims in Western Societies is Not Possible’ from this past April. Muslims will not integrate into Western society because it isn’t compatible with Islam. They should be stopped from coming to this country until such time that as Dr. Nicolai Sennels says, it can be proven integration is possible. That would be never.

As for the media hype that Islam is the “fastest growing religion in the world,” prove it. From my research, thankfully, Muslims are leaving that totalitarian “religion” in large numbers and converting to Christianity:

What do you think the reason is for Muslims leaving their religion in droves?

When Muslims convert: “But far less attention has been paid to voyages in the opposite direction, that is, outward from Islam. In fact, thousands of Muslims in the West embrace Christianity each year, and the courage they must muster to do so is of an entirely different order from the bravado of someone protesting against supposedly pervasive social prejudice. These converts stand accused, rather, of apostasy, a transgression against Islam whose consequences, even in the sheltering confines of the West, are always serious–and sometimes deadly.

“In the Islamic world, there is a broad consensus, both popular and scholarly, that apostates deserve to be killed. A rich theological and intellectual tradition, stretching as far back as Muhammad and his companions, supports this position. Though official proceedings against those who reject Islam are fairly rare–in part, no doubt, because most keep their conversion a closely held secret–apostasy is punishable by death in Afghanistan, Comoros, Iran, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Yemen.1 It is also illegal in Jordan, Kuwait, Malaysia, the Maldives, Oman, and Qatar.”

Muslims Leaving Islam in Droves

What kind of religion forces you to be a believer or face death? Not Christianity. Not Judaism. Only Islam.

Next is my series is about Sharia law and why Muslims are a very real threat to the security of this republic.

Footnotes:
[1] Muhammad, Aisha, Islam and Child Brides
[2] Was Muhammad a Pedophile?
[3] Saudi Clerics Advocate Adult Breast-Feeding
Other links:
Saudi Girl, 12, Wins Divorce From 80-Year-Old Husband
Child marriage still an issue in Saudi Arabia
Muslim child brides on rise in Canada
Imam charged with sex offences

Devvy Kidd authored the booklets, Why A Bankrupt America and Blind Loyalty; 2 million copies distributed. Devvy appears on radio shows all over the country. She left the Republican Party in 1996 and has been an independent voter ever since. Devvy is a constitutionalist who believes in the supreme law of the land, not some political party.
Visit Devvy’s website at: http://www.devvy.com. You can also sign up for her free email alerts. Devvy’s radio show broadcasts Mon-Fri. To listen, go to: http://www.devvy.com/new_site/rense_show.html

 

WesternFront America

The March 2010 issue of Sojourners Magazine pictured on its cover an adorable Hispanic child with a caption next to the photograph reading “Citizen or Criminal”. Inside the issue were a number of articles expositing how Christians are obligated to basically surrender America to outsiders, most of whom defended by the magazine have no standing to be in the United States to begin with.

For example, one pullout quote in red (no doubt playing on the conditioning that the red words in some Bibles carry more weight than the others) read, “If we are truly about family values, how can we argue for a system that separates parents from their citizen children.” Notice how the onus is placed on America rather than the Mexican government for the responsibility of family reunification or cohesion.

Maybe our neighbors to the south should make it easier for children beyond its borders to be repatriated there with their parents. After all, the likes of James Dobson has in the past lectured Pat Buchanan how the family values of Mexicans are superior to those of the average American.

It is interesting how Sojourners, a publication that doesn’t really give a hoot about the Word of God any other time given its modernistic and liberal affiliations, suddenly knows all of the verses admonishing the believer to aide the plight of the downtrodden. What about the verse extolling obedience to properly constituted laws (such as those administering the immigration process)?

Another column condemned the ethnocentrism of the American church and that “broadening immigration … allows the church to pray and worship in a new way.” Frankly, what was so wrong with the old way?

Perhaps it should be pointed out that so-called “minority churches” are the ones most mired in the respective ethnicities and cultures of those in attendance. Furthermore, special outreaches and semi-independent “sub-congregations” are not being set up by spineless American congregations for the purposes of preserving the traditional mainstream culture. Rather, these are established because the targeted immigrants are so reinforced these days as to what their particular breed of man happens to be that they won’t set foot in a church unless the ecclesiastical authorities fawn all over them and cater to them to the same extent as the other social welfare bureaucracies they are accustomed to dealing with.

And when was the last time a minister ever admonished the new arrivals to make up their minds as to whether or not they want to be Americans or remain what they were originally and to go back from wherever they came? It is about time to stop playing both sides of the identity equation where one plays up what nationality that happens to get the largest government or charitable handout or which provides the most rational explanation for one’s glaring flaws in terms of character and behavior.

But whereas nearly no one — typically liberal but increasingly conservative as well — will tackle the shortcomings of immigrants in regards to ecclesiastical practices and preferences, “Anglos” are being given an earful on this topic all of the time. At one church I stopped going to, after a snafu with the sound system, instead of simply adjusting the volume, the pastor went into a semi-lengthy explanation of how the controls had been fiddled with for the raucous auditory preferences of the immigrant congregation borrowing the facility the night before.

The verbal smackdown did not end there. We ignorant rubes learned it was our obligation to relent since the immigrant congregation, rather than the one actually floating the bills, was the one on the cutting edge and thus the “In thing”.

This was not the only incident of pandering to minorities at this particular church. Following the announcement of the district’s ministerial candidates ordained last year, only the Hispanic ones were specifically mentioned in a commemorating prayer.

In previously solid churches slowly eroding to the spirit of the age, Whitey and anyone else speaking English is suppose to simply shut up and just keep dropping the coins into the collection plate until the gullible old White people die off. And you had better have a smile on your face with a “please sir, may I have another” attitude or you’re not a good Christian anymore. Frankly, I don’t remember national weakness being commanded anywhere in the pages of the Bible.

Others will insist that since the Bible in general and the Gospel in specific counsels that all who accept Christ belong to the family of God irrespective of nationality or ethnicity, congregations should avoid this characteristic to such an extent that congregations that once sat solemnly in the pews should now do back-flips over them and role around on the floor in testament to just how free of bias the parishioners happen to be. If Americans have to renounce their culture that is probably already about as heterogeneous as a nation can be as countries with even lesser degrees of diversity are characterized by regular ethnic bloodshed, then why are Evangelicals putting up with La Razaesque front groups such as the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference having the motto “Empowering the Hispanic Church, Engaging the Hispanic Vision and Enriching the Hispanic Dream”.

In the mission statement on the masthead of Sojourners it reads, “The mission of Sojourners magazine is to inspire hope and action by articulating the biblical call to racial and social justice.” If this leftist rag is really concerned about justice, than they ought to publish another issue on immigration with a tattooed gang member on the cover and articles detailing how unbridled immigration has ruined many neighborhoods and the violence that has been inflicted on Americans either in their homes or through the many that have died in car crashes the result of foreigners that can’t even exercise the minutest degree of self-control when it comes to booze.

© Dr. Frederick Meekins

 

WesternFront America

We now know that environmentalism is a religion. It is, of course, a pagan religion, but a religion, nevertheless.

So, I must ask the question: How can those who profess to be Christians, subscribe to the tenants of environmentalism, and be true to the teachings of Christianity? The answer is — they can’t.

Yes, I am aware that I am stepping off into deep water here, troubled water, to be sure.

“God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (From The Bible — Genesis 1:28)

This command from God to man was the first recorded “commission” given man by his Creator. Today that “First Commission” is in direct conflict with the teachings of those who see the earth, itself, as god (Gaia). They teach that man should submit to Gaia, Mother Earth, rather than obey the one, true, God and subdue the earth and make it work for us.

By and large, until the environmental movement/religion, man had subdued the earth. In fact, man was reaching out into the galaxy, the universe, seeking other “earths” to subdue. And that was good. However, these days the nation that leads all others on this planet, has decided it no longer wants to seek out new worlds to conquer. It now wants only to save the earth, our home, from man himself.

Do you detect the arrogance in such a goal? Man actually believes HE can destroy the earth. Recent events with a single volcano in Iceland should have given those who believe such tripe pause. And please don’t point to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico from the collapsed oil rig. Last I heard, some 4 to 5 million gallons of oil had spilled into the waters of the Gulf. Are you aware that each year some 62 million gallons of oil are naturally leaked into to the ocean from undersea deposits of oil? (SOURCE). Yes, it just seeps up through the sea floor.

Facts are stubborn things. Apparently, the environmentalists have bought so deeply into the fantasy that man is the ultimate being that they are blinded by the glare of their own self-righteousness and unapologetic arrogance.

The planet earth could wipe out all living beings: man, animal, plant, it makes no difference, in a matter of minutes, IF it had a consciousness and a mind with which to plan and then execute those plans. Earth has neither. Yet, at a moment’s notice, it could STILL wipe the surface of the earth clean of all living things.

If you have ever witnessed a dog shake its coat dry after a dip in a pond, or lake, or river, consider the dog’s coat as the surface of the earth. Observe how the dog’s coat moves right and left as the dog shakes and notice the droplets of water flying off the individual hairs of the dog’s coat. In much the same way, the earth could rid itself of the parasites on its surface.

And yet man feels he must protect mother earth? Protect her from WHAT, exactly? Long after every trace of mankind has been erased from this planet, earth will continue to spin and follow its orbit around the sun, quietly whiling away the millennia in the vastness of space and the infinity of time.

It is troubling, indeed, it is sad to recognize that most, if not all, of the mainline Christian religious denominations in America have bought into the hoax of Global Warming, or “Climate Change,” as they prefer to call it these days. But, it is not surprising. You see, in my opinion, most of the mainline religious denominations in America have been hi-jacked by the political left. That accounts for all the sermons on social justice, saving the environment, diversity, inclusiveness, etc.

Dear reader, I have to wonder, if the American Christians who have bought into this “clap-trap” actually believe that heaven is inclusive? If they cracked the covers of their bibles and read them a bit, they’d soon learn that heaven is certainly NOT inclusive — nor diverse — and there is no problem with the environment. If the pastors of the mainline denominations would teach more scripture and less Marxism from their pulpits, the average church-going American would already know this.

The evangelical Christians in America, much despised by the political left, seem to be the only Christian group not buying into the pagan belief in Gaia, or Mother Earth, and the necessity of man’s fealty to her. They believe than man should be a good steward of the earth, which they understand is but a “way-station” for man on his way to his ultimate home somewhere beyond space, beyond time, in the presence of God, wherever that may be.

Meanwhile, the struggle continues for the consciousness of man and for the soul of man. Environmentalism is but one of the many tools used by the forces of evil arrayed against those who remain true to their Christian faith.

I believe the environmentalism religion was spawned by the dark forces of evil as a weapon to be used for the destruction of man. It reeks of Marxism, and communism, and socialism, and collectivism. Not only will it NOT save the earth — on the contrary — by depriving man of the earth’s resources it will drive man back into a new Dark Age and pit us against one another in an epic struggle for our very existence.

It is time for the people of this earth to “Man-Up” and stop their whimpish ways and accept that for man to survive and thrive on this planet we must make use of its bounty to the fullest. Believe me, it will be here, renewing itself, long after you and I are gone.

© J. D. Longstreet

J. D. Longstreet blogs daily at INSIGHT on Freedom at: http://www.csadispatch.blogspot.com/

E-Mail: longstreet1862@gmail.com

 

WesternFront America