From WILLIAM EDELEN
The Contrary Minister (2002)
A friend has worked for Planned Parenthood for a good many years. She lives in a major American city. She called recently and asked me to tell my readers about Christian terrorism right here in the United States.
She said: “Do your readers have any idea what it is like to go to work day after day wondering if there is some Christian nut waiting with a bomb or gun for you?”
Listen to Jerry Falwell: “The idea that church and state should be separated was invented by the devil to keep Christians from running this country. I really believe that the pagans… and the abortionists… and the feminists… and the gays and lesbians… as well as the ACLU and the People For The American Way… all of them… should take the blame for God allowing this to happen. I point my finger in their face and say that to them.” (talking about the Trade Center bombing.)
My subject is Christian terrorism in America. Are you aware of how convicted bomber Mahmud Abouhalima, a Muslim, and Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Billy Graham’s son, Franklin, all sound exactly alike using the same kind of terrorist language?
Do you understand what my friend is talking about? What she fears daily, with Christian fanatics on the loose in our society? Forget about the Muslims for a day or two and become concerned and informed about the Christian terrorists in every state in America.
If an alarm is not going off in your head… you must be sound asleep or else living in a make believe world of fantasy.
Prayer in public schools… Tuition tax credits for Christian schools… Federal government cutting off funds for medical counseling and abortion clinics… A President who proclaims a Year of the Bible… to the exclusion of millions of Buddhists, Agnostics, Humanists, Free Thinkers, Taoists, Hindu, Atheists, etc… all U.S. citizens… A President who declares a national Day of Prayer… (only Governor Ventura told them NO… no day of prayer in my state… out of respect for all of my citizens who do not believe in mixing state and religion)… A former U.S. President George Bush, who said at a press conference that “I do not consider atheists to be citizens of America”… The first six Presidents of the United States turned over in their grave, and cried, at that show of ignorance as to what America is all about.
Ignorance is flowing from religiously and historically illiterate speakers and columnists on local and national levels. Kathleen Parker, writing in her USA Today column, proclaimed in her most stupid essay that there were no atheists in the World Trade Center on September 11… “even as there are never any atheists in foxholes…” What hogwash! What baloney! What nonsense! In my twelve years as Marine Corps pilot in both WWII and Korea, I knew many, I repeat MANY, Marines who were atheists and who had nothing to do with God freaks or Jesus jazzers.
I could list examples of Christian terrorism in this country that would fill this entire newspaper.
My own life was threatened in Idaho by Christian fundamentalists. One made the mistake of putting his threat on my answering machine. The police recognized him. He ended up in jail.
A good friend of mine accepted the position of pastor of a Presbyterian church in Northern Indiana, His 8-year-old daughter came home from school one day crying out of control. My friend asked his daughter what happened. She said that her teacher at school told her she was going to burn in hell forever. My friend was livid. He went to the teacher furious and was told that she could tell by the look in his daughter’s eyes. The teacher was active in a Christian fundamentalist church in that town. My friend then went to the School Board, and discovered that they saw nothing wrong with the teachers opinion on hell and his daughter. The School Board had any number of members in that same fundamentalist church. My friend and his family promptly moved from that community.
Do you understand why my friend asked me to write about Christian terrorism right here in the United States? If you do not understand, she invites you to come join her for a week and ride to work… ride to work with her… wondering… wondering… wondering… what Christian nut might be waiting… with a bomb… or a gun to put to your head.
~~
Right now I am sad that I don’t have a meeting for worship where folks at least are willing to be called on their second hand depraved thinking. Anti-religionist and other liberal thinkers would do well to form Sunday morning discussion groups. Quaker meeting for worship is my first choice, but, alas, depraved thinking is eating the heart out of the Quaker testimonies (statements of common aspirations). Turns out that the Society of Friends isn’t always friendly, especially when there are Christian fundamentalist thinkers present. Sometimes the Unitarian Universalist present a viable option, but that is largely an urban phenomena, and like the Quakers, one is increasingly likely to have ones worshipful mind pushed out of the way by conflating angry politics with worship. Still, a UU fellowship can be a wonderful place to worship together with peaceful folks. One venue I have always been interested in, but not had the opportunity to share, is the Ethical Culture Society. I really like their avowed principles:
*The belief that morality is independent of theology;
*The affirmation that new moral problems have arisen in modern industrial society which have not been adequately dealt with by the world’s religions;
*The duty to engage in philanthropy in the advancement of morality;
*The belief that self-reform should go in lock step with social reform;
*The establishment of republican rather than monarchical governance of Ethical societies
*The agreement that educating the young is the most important aim.
Of course there is nothing in the way of independent thinkers, social justice activist, self identified “progressive thinkers” and the rest of the rational rabble – I like to call us the Reality Based Community – coming together on Sunday mornings and participate in a celebration of their ideals. It would be a very good thing. Too bad that the reaction formation to established religion largely prevents us from formally getting together. That is the triumph of religious propaganda. They have managed to exclude their enemies from an essential need to come together as worshipers. With this they have outflanked us and effectively prevented us from forming viable, long term associations. Membership without participation, the experience of countless well meaning folks who join one well meaning organization after another, is an oxymoronic idea. Sending money to such groups can be a real problem when it is misused. Membership organizations seem to exist to sabotage good intentions. One’s spiritual life is not enhanced, and is probably damaged, by passive commitments. The more remote organizations one sends money to buy the privilege of feeling good about one’s character the more difficult it becomes to manage that character.
So here is the challenge. Readers of this blog commit to come together, maybe at Dave’s shop, one Sunday morning and see what happens. I would vote for singing songs together. “Solidarity forever, solidarity forever…”
ybera
The main point is well taken: threats of violence, violence, and violent opposition to the government are no more acceptable when they come from fringe Christians instead of fringe Muslims. Let’s work on developing a consensus in our community about that and not muddy the waters by insisting that others adopt our own theological views, ‘truths,’ and prejudices. I think the danger here is in painting with too broad a brush.
Morality, ethics, are great but not enough to address the corruption in the world and in the human heart. We really did not make ourselves or happen into existence by cosmic accident. There is enough glory around us to apprehend the Creator to whom we owe allegiance and adoration, surrendering to living our lives as to following the maintenance specs of the Manufactures Owner’s Manual. A loving Creator needs no false worship as from puppets or from robots, hence, the crowning achievement of centuries of philosophical and spiritual thinking: “freedom of conscience.” Separation of church and state allows this freedom to flourish only when a people are a moral people. When in their freedom they choose destructive behaviors, chaos and human misery break down society. Freedom is forfeited in anarchy and chaos and violence. When separation of church and state does not honor all moral frameworks, whether religious or secular, freedom of conscience , too, will be forfeited by
legal constructs of religious conformity, as seen in the midieval church.
Sometimes people discover that they are people of faith and didn’t even know it. They discover that the standard definition projected by organized religion is too restrictive. I, for instance am quite comfortable with my faith that none of us, at least certainly not me, has the biological equipment to say anything useful about any supposed supreme being, if that is indeed any sort of useful noun. I worship the miracle of precious life myself. Life can not be asked why it exists, so I don’t. But collective worship, particularly silent worship, of necessity, requires a level beyond ideology. Virtually everyone participates in public moments of silent prayer willingly, even if it is only to remain silent, which is all that is required. It may be human to question, but it is foolish to expect answers about things that we are not equipped to understand.
Not that I am unsympathetic to those who are tied to some scripture or the other. It is soooo much easier that way. It is just that I consider organized religion to be just another, particularly wide spread and dangerous, behavioral addiction. Like Fox News for instance. You stand there in church, belting out some hymn in aching disharmony, and it visits you, if ever so briefly, that spiritual high, and you want more and want it again. And organized religion makes sure that another legal addiction has its way with us. Marx’s most famous quote, it IS an opiate. I’m comfortable with a harder path that welcomes the high but does not need it to feel spiritual.
The political aspect of organized religion, something actually separate from the spiritual aspect and destructive of it, that worries us all. Even then, it is the upper reaches of the church hierarchies that are the problem. An obvious ploy is to not follow an organized religion. Many disaffected people of the book show up at liberal religious services as spiritual refugees because there may not be a God-the-father to be found but there is a liturgy. In the case of many Unitarian Universalist congregations the facsimile is nearly complete, right down to the hymnals in the little shelves attached to the back of the front pew filled with all the classic Protestant hymns with the word God deleted. Each to his own, but seeking that spiritual high that comes from group worship should not be an enslavement, as it often is currently.
Worship is so easy really. Just sincerely talk to the wild birds. When you have their attention both of you are in awe of something beyond either’s understanding.
While you are at it on these sunny days, try looking at the full sun (with your eyes shut!) for three or four minutes, then go look into a darkened room. My wife is recommending this and she is a doctor, so it must be safe, or at least that is my faith. It is fun. There is no reason worship should not be fun. Quite the contrary.
ybera
It appears that anything that is negative on here is deleted…lol. Yep! Free Speech is not allowed.
Oh? I would be interested in the general features.
ybera
What are you refering to?
speaking to ybera:
organized religion can be a behavioral addiction, but true ‘religion’ actually is relationship to the One, or the Three-in-One, who is bigger than ourselves, who created us, wired us for relationship in morality, and re-creates us, that is redeems us, when we find our own selves inadequate for truth and beauty.
Want to see one of the greatest testimonies to the God of relationship of our time? google Nick Vujicic and ‘Life Without Limbs.’
obedienceoffaith
When I refer to a healthy spiritual life I am probably meaning what you mean by “true” religion. Orangeade religion can spin off truly spiritual people, but in the balance it discriminates against them. The Roman Catholic Church, for instance, has involved many highly spiritual (and therefore highly moral and ethical) people, such as the Berrigan brothers and the Liberation Theology movement, and it also has been uniformly aggressive toward them. It is a relentlessly complex world full of contradictions. This is where moral courage comes in handy lest we become demoralized and loose our faith, in the spiritual meaning of the term.
I am drawn to Quakerism in the West and Buddhism in the East. That is I have a very Eastern side, presumably because of the years I spent in SE Asia, and the side of my birth. The Quakers have a fascinating pamphlet written by a Buddhist monk comparing Quakerism to Zen Buddhism. Pretty close and neither is centrally organized.
ybera
Wish this thing had an edit option. Second line should read “organized religion”