Category: Theocracy

And so it continues

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Not unexpected — the Israelis have been even more blatant in land grabs lately, several Palestinians have been seriously injured and one bus driver was found hanged in his bus. (Officials said it was a suicide.) Now we have this horrendous attack on people praying at a synagogue, and of course it will be used as a reason for more violence:

JERUSALEM — Two Palestinians armed with knives, axes and a gun stormed a synagogue in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood on Tuesday, killing three Americans — including a prominent rabbi — and a British worshiper in one of the deadliest attacks in years in Jerusalem.

The attackers — identified by Palestinian media as residents of mostly Arab East Jerusalem — were then killed by police in an aftermath that vividly showed the razor-edge tensions in Jerusalem after weeks of bloodshed and clashes.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Palestinian leaders of inciting violence and promised to “respond harshly.” In the Palestinian-controlled Gaza Strip, calls over loudspeakers praised the attackers.

In East Jerusalem, crowds hurled stones at Israeli police fanning out around the neighborhood where the attackers lived.

The Associated Press, citing Israeli police, said those killed included one Briton and three Americans — among them Rabbi Moshe Twersky, who taught at an English-speaking religious school in Jerusalem and was a member of one of the most respected families in Orthodox scholarship.

And they’ll know we are Christians by our love

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Via JT Eberhard at What Would JT Do:

The Unitarian Universality church in my hometown of Mountain Home, Arkansas recently published a letter in the local paper letting the community know that they welcome everyone at their church regardless of race, religion, or sexual orientation.
The reaction? The church had its windows shot out one night and were left this note:

hatemail

Have you ever noticed that the more hateful they are, the less likely they know how to spell?

Wingnut cardinals undermine Pope Frank

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

Pope Francis in St. Peter's Square-1
Photo by Gabriel Sozzi via Wikimedia Commons

As a fallen-away “cradle Catholic,” one who used to love arguing with my religion teachers about things like reincarnation, or women priests (“But if only men can be priests because Jesus only picked male apostles, shouldn’t priests have to be Jewish, too?”), I get a kick out of Pope Francis. He reminds me of that all-too-brief reign of Pope John XXIII, the last “people’s Pope.” He is a compassionate man who radiates the best qualities of the Church — namely, a strong foundation in social justice and mercy.

He hasn’t gone as far in liberalizing the Church as I’d like, but he shows signs that he’s getting there.

But the same Catholic conservatives who were so eager to snuggle under the covers with the worst elements of the right wing have learned a thing or two from U.S. politics — basically, how to undercut and erode the authority of a duly-elected leader. This is actually serious, and I’m only slightly kidding when I say I fervently hope this pope avoids small planes.

Matters came to a head last week when Pope Francis removed the extremely conservative U.S. Cardinal Raymond Burke from his influential post as head of the church’s highest court, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. (Think of him as Tony Scalia, making distorted pronouncements about “original intent.”) Burke proclaims his version of what the Pope can or can’t do, and Pope Francis is supposed to fall into a worshipful crouch in front of Burke’s embroidered slippers.

It’s not working out that way. Pope Francis has his own ideas, and when a recent report indicated that an upcoming church synod might loosen church policies on divorce and gay marriage, conservatives led by Cardinal Burke went on the attack. German Cardinal Walter Kasper hit back:

In an interview this week, Kasper expressed confidence that bishops at the back-to-back synods would ultimately back some change, and he hit back at critics like Burke, saying they are engaged in political maneuverings. He said they are afraid that any changes would lead to a “domino effect.”

“This is all linked to ideology, an ideological understanding of the gospel that the gospel is like a penal code,” Kasper, who is retired from a curial job but lives in Rome, told America magazine.

Heh. See what I mean? Scalia!

Burke is, to me, the worst kind of Church prelate, known not only for his rigid views on abortion and gays and his willingness to aid the Republican right wing, but for his love of the kind of gaudier ceremonial frippery most cardinals had the taste to leave behind a half-century ago. (All for the greater glory of God, I’m sure.)

As an authoritarian, of course, he was not so quick to address the sexual abuse scandal. As the National Catholic Reporter noted last month:

Cardinal Burke would do us all a favor to examine the second component of the clergy sex abuse scandal, that component that deals with his episcopal colleagues. He might ask why canon law has not come to the aid of the children in a forthright and active manner. He might ask how church law has allowed his fellow bishops to cover up the scandal rather than bringing to public. He might examine how church law has played a role in driving many Catholics, disaffected by the scandal, from the church.

And since he got demoted, he’s doing his best to damn Francis with faint praise:

American Cardinal Raymond Burke, the feisty former archbishop of St. Louis who has emerged as the face of the opposition to Pope Francis’ reformist agenda, likened the Roman Catholic Church to “a ship without a rudder” in a fresh attack on the pope’s leadership.

In an interview with the Spanish Catholic weekly Vida Nueva, published Thursday (Oct. 30), Burke insisted he was not speaking out against the pope personally but raising concern about his leadership.

“Many have expressed their concerns to me. At this very critical moment, there is a strong sense that the church is like a ship without a rudder,” Burke said.

Hey, we’ve seen “The Borgias,” Cardinal Burke. We know what you’re doing! (We’ve also seen Mitch McConnell, Karl Rove, and Fox News in action.)

Conservatives have privately labeled Francis “the anti-Christ” and illegitimate, just as Obama was “the Kenyan” who couldn’t legally be president. In the National Catholic Reporter, Michael Sean Winters calls them “Tea Party Catholics” and writes:

Regrettably, I suspect those who disapprove of Pope Francis constitute a larger share of the clergy and the episcopate than the laity. When bishops temporize in public, as we have seen for example in Bishop Robert Morlino’s ill-advised interviews, or in comments from Cardinal Raymond Burke, you can bet that those same prelates, in private, are hearing, or saying, the kinds of things Fr. Longenecker records in this remarkable piece. And, before he got booted off the Congregation for Bishops, Cardinal Burke was able to place many like-minded prelates in some prominent sees.

Longenecker writes:

Some have given up on Pope Francis. Others say he is “the false prophet” who will accompany the anti Christ in the end times. Others don’t like his dress sense, grumble about his media gaffes and some think they are all intentional and that he is a very shrewd Jesuit who wants to undermine the Catholic faith.

Clearly, Father is not speaking to the same Catholics I speak with, although I did hear a bishop speculate on the fact that “we can’t dismiss the possibility that there could be another anti-pope.” I like the way Fr. Longenecker, following a model set forth previously by Archbishop Chaput, and by the Wizard of Oz before that, places these concerns in the mouths of others, nonetheless giving them oxygen by reporting them. The idea that Pope Francis “is a very shrewd Jesuit who wants to undermine the Catholic faith” really did not need to be reported in order to continue with the article, did it? And, the observation reads like something you would find in an early eighteenth century Jansenist tract, an analogy that bears further reflection because of the Jansenist tendencies of the anti-Francis brigade.

It sounds so familiar, doesn’t it? The sly words, the implication of weakness, the veiled accusations of undermining the very foundations of the institution?

I remember enough of my twelve years of Bible study to know that Jesus, asked about the greatest commandment, reportedly replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

I could be wrong, but I think Pope Francis comes a lot closer to that spirit than Cardinal Burke. Your mileage, of course, may vary.

H/t Karin Riley Porter Attorney at Law.

Joni Ernst is even worse than Michelle Bachmann

~ susie ~ 2 Comments

Joni Ernst

And it looks like she’s going to win. Thirty percent of her supporters will vote for her because it is “a step toward repealing Obamacare.” How extreme is she? She voted to make abortion illegal for women with ectopic pregnancies — which would kill them.

The poll attributed Ernst’s boost to voters viewing her as strong on national security issues, and being better able to address Social Security, government gridlock. The survey also found that voters see Ernst as better reflecting Iowa values. “She’s more of a regular, down-to-earth person,” the paper wrote.

Earlier on Saturday, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid warned Democrats that they couldn’t afford to lose Iowa, as it would hand Republicans control of the upper chamber. “If we win Iowa, we’re going to do just fine,” he said. “Iowa is critical. There’s no other way to say it.” He also criticized Ernst as extreme. “Think of what that would mean for our country,” he said of her potential win.

The race to fill the seat of outgoing Sen. Tom Harkin (D) has been one of the most competitive of the election year. Earlier polls showed the two neck-and-neck. But fear has grown among Democrats that the party would lose Iowa, one of the key battlegrounds in the election.

H/t Kush Arora Attorney at Law.

Bye, Mike

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out:

This morning’s broadcast of the American Family Association’s “Today’s Issues” program was dedicated to promoting the AFA’s “A Time to Speak” documentary, which is aimed at getting pastors to mobilize their congregations to vote in the upcoming elections.

One guest on the program was Mike Huckabee, who began his interview by threatening to leave the Republican Party if the GOP does not take a stand against the Supreme Court’s decision yesterday not to hear appeals of lower court rulings striking down gay marriage bans in several states.

Incensed by the decision, Huckabee declared that “I am utterly exasperated with Republicans and the so-called leadership of the Republicans who have abdicated on this issue,” warning that by doing so the GOP will “guarantee they’re going to lose every election in the future.”

“Guarantee it,” he said before proclaiming that the Republicans are going to “lose guys like me and a whole bunch of still God-fearing, Bible-believing people” if the party does not stand and fight on the issues of gay marriage and abortion.”

Billion-dollar right wing bash

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

the Crusades were shameful, bloody, and tragic affairs

So much money working against us, but they still can’t stop us from voting:

Have you heard of “The Gathering,” a conference of extreme hard right Christian funders, which starts Thursday in Orlando FL?

“The Gathering,” an event put on by Washington’s shadowy hard rightwing “Church” known only as “THE FAMILY”/”THE FELLOWSHIP” (“THE FAMILY” also puts on the Presidents Prayer Breakfast every February in Washington DC); “THE FAMILY” brings together big names in Evangelical circles to advance a hard-right agenda:

destroy gay rights, destroy women’s right to reproductive decision-making, privatize public schools, Evangelize the world, attack opposing religions, and destroy public opinion about climate change

Attendees include the Green family from Hobby Lobby, the Cathy family from Chick-Fil-A, the Coors family, and David Brooks from the New York Times, among many others.

“The Gathering” espouses 7 Mountains Dominionism, aka New Apostolic Reformation theology, and funnels Billions of dollars every year into extreme hard right political candidates and “FAMILY”-friendly organizations to help infiltrate secular media.

And Jesus said, ‘Whatsoever you do to entertain the poor, you do unto Me’

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

republican-jesus

I guess it didn’t occur to them to provide food and job training?

An Alabama megachurch recently held an open house to showcase their $26 million multipurpose complex complete with a 12-lane bowling center, wedding venue, fitness center, and cafe.

Faith Chapel Christian Center located near Birmingham funded the project with tithes and offerings from their more than 6,000 members. Although the entertainment center has been open for a year, the megachurch is just now getting around to introducing it to the low-income community that it is located in.

“People may not want to come to a church, but they’ll come to a bowling alley,” Pastor Michael Moore told AL.com. “People have needs other than spiritual needs. There’s a need for safe, clean, uplifting, family-oriented entertainment.”

Moore notes that the center, called The Bridge, was built for the community because family-friendly social options were lacking in their town of Wylam, which he calls “an area that’s depressed.”

Antoinette Mays, the spokesperson for Faith Chapel told a local Fox News affiliate back in July that Moore had a vision for the complex years before beginning construction.

“We want kids to walk in and have a wow moment and think, ‘A church can do that?'” said Mays. “We want this to be an inspiration for little kids, for other pastors to say ‘Hey, we can do his too! ‘ It’s a place where people will come and be ministered to.”

The abortion ministry of Dr. Willie Parker

~ susie

What would women do without brave doctors like this? Yet another hero:

After medical school, he bought a big house and a nice car and overstuffed his refrigerator the way people from poverty do, but those satisfactions soon seemed empty. He dated but never quite settled down. Inspired by Gandhi’s idea that the Gospel should appear to a hungry man in the form of bread, he went to work in a food pantry. But gradually, the steady stream of women with reproductive issues in his practice focused his mind. He thought about his mother and sisters and the grandmother who died in childbirth and began to read widely in the literature of civil rights and feminism. Eventually he came across the concept of “reproductive justice,” developed by black feminists who argued that the best way to raise women out of poverty is to give them control of their reproductive decisions. Finally, he had his “come to Jesus” moment and the bell rang. This would be his civil-rights struggle. He would serve women in their darkest moment of need. “The protesters say they’re opposed to abortion because they’re Christian,” Parker says. “It’s hard for them to accept that I do abortions because I’m a Christian.” He gave up obstetrics to become a full-time abortionist on the day, five years ago, that George Tiller was murdered in church.

Now he rushes around all the time, flying from Chicago to Philadelphia to Birmingham, where he picks up a car at his brother’s house and drives to the pink building in the artsy district of Jackson, where he proceeds down a hall lined with women waiting on plastic chairs to the saddest little desk you’ve ever seen—actually part of a hutch ripped from its base and turned to the middle of the room, raw wallboard showing. The women now come in one by one, asking questions they didn’t want to ask in the group.

“Can I call and change my mind?”

“Can I go back to work the next day?”

“Can my mom be in the room with me?”

The oldest woman of the group says she has a son who’s nineteen and a daughter who’s seventeen, and she just had a baby two years ago who died of a heart defect. “She came home and everything,” she says in a mournful voice. Plus she’s anemic but not taking drugs for it. And she has asthma. And possibly a touch of bronchitis.

Another woman asks how long it will take before she can wear tampons again. “I know this sounds so selfish and everything, but I’m going to the beach next week—don’t think I’m a selfish person!”

Several women say they’ve always been against abortion, but they’re not emotionally or financially ready to have a baby. “I just wish that people that are so against it could understand,” one says. “These old men out here protesting do not have vaginas or uteruses.”

“Preach,” Parker says.

“It just makes me so mad!”

Parker’s beaming again, grinning wide. If this happened to men, he says, abortion would be free and they’d pass out free Super Bowl tickets and have public ceremonies to celebrate our brothers who went through the tough decision. He wishes more women had her righteous indignation instead of shame.

When the skinny Army veteran comes in, Parker tells her she made his day with her offer to contribute. Most women are just relieved to get it over with. They never want to see this place again.

“Actually, I want to apply for a job,” she says.

“You should,” he says.

“I will,” she replies. “Even if I don’t get a job, I’ll still come back and volunteer. I just want to be a part of this.”

Via Nicole Naum Attorney at Law.

‘Brutally honest’ with the Vatican

~ susie ~ 4 Comments

2014_EuroTrip_1988.jpg

Not at all surprised that no one’s paying attention to the church on sex. Is anyone?

VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican conceded Thursday that most Catholics reject its teachings on sex and contraception as intrusive and irrelevant and officials pledged not to “close our eyes to anything” when it opens a two-year debate on some of the thorniest issues facing the church.

Core church doctrine on the nature of marriage, sexuality, abortion and divorce isn’t expected to change as a result of the debate that opens in October. But Pope Francis is well aware that the church has lost much of its relevance and credibility in today’s secular world and he is seeking to redirect his ministers to offer families, and even gays in civil unions, a “new language” that is welcoming and responds to their needs.

The Vatican on Thursday issued the working document for the synod discussions, which in itself marked a sharp change from past practice: The Vatican sent out a 39-point questionnaire seeking input from ordinary Catholics around the world about their understanding of, and adherence to, the church’s teaching on sexuality, homosexuality, contraception, marriage and divorce.

Thousands of ordinary Catholics, clergy and academics responded, providing the Vatican with an unprecedented compilation of grass-root data to guide the discussion. Usually, such working papers are compiled by bishops alone.

The responses, which were summarized in the working document, were brutally honest.

“A vast majority” of responses stressed that “the moral evaluation of the different methods of birth control is commonly perceived today as an intrusion in the intimate life of the couple and an encroachment on the autonomy of conscience,” the document said.

“Many responses recommend that for many Catholics the concept of ‘responsible parenthood’ encompasses the shared responsibility in conscience to choose the most appropriate method of birth control.”