Last week I taped an interview with Sister Maureen Fielder, host of "Interfaith Voices," a popular radio program exploring religious issues that is carried by many NPR stations.
The topic of the show was Indiana's new "religious freedom" law, and appearing with me was Mollie Ziegler Hemingway, senior editor at The Federalist, a libertarian journal. We had a spirited but thoughtful discussion.
The recent endorsement of marriage equality by the Presbyterian Church (USA) seemed like a good moment to discuss the campaign to divide and conquer the mainline Protestant churches, at LGBTQ Nation -- FC
The Presbyterian Church (USA) has recently been in the news for its historic approval of marriage equality. But in these news stories, you may have noticed that Christian Right organizations that are unhappy with the outcome are promoting the idea that people are leaving this and other churches because of their support for equal rights, and for rejecting the Right's corrupt and redefined version of religious freedom.
As is often the case, the Christian Right's claims don't hold much water.
I have had the honor of speaking at a number of these events over the years. This year, I will be speaking on a panel about knowing and resisting the Right. (Anyone who happens to come, please say hello!)
Events like this are rare. And a national conference that takes the time to feature a discussion of the role of the religious and political right in order to develop sound understandings of the right in order to better advance social justice, is unfortunately, even more rare.
As I reported in September 2014, Bishop Robert Finn, head of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Missouri has been under Vatican investigation to determine if he should be forced to step down. The lead investigator has apparently concluded it is time for Finn to go.
While this is a step in the right direction, so many Catholics are wondering - even members of the Pope's own committee to weed out sexual abuse in the church -- what is taking so long?
This is a transcript, of pastor Larry Huch and Rafael Cruz, father of U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, from an appearance Rafael Cruz made at the Irving, Texas New Beginnings megachurch on August 26, 2012.
First, Huch and Cruz discuss Ted Cruz as one of the "anointed" who will bring about a "great wealth transfer" from the "wicked" to the "righteous" (see transcript). Towards the end of the ceremony, Huch prophesies to Rafael Cruz that Ted Cruz, who had just won his senate seat, was destined for greater things. One day, Huch prophesied, Ted Cruz would be Vice President or a U.S. Supreme Court Justice.
Ted Cruz threw his hat into the ring, announcing his bid for President in the worship center at Jerry Falwell's University last night. Mother Jones magazine just recently published a story claiming Cruz argued the case for defending the state of Texas' right to execute an obviously mentally retarded man. Scott Panetti, the convicted murderer, fit just about anybody's definition of insane. Scott had frequent verbal contact with John Kennedy and Jesus.
[welcome, Thom Hartmann Show fans, here is a short introduction to my past coverage on Ted Cruz and the dominionist Christian right]
Did you known that Ted Cruz and his father helped establish the presidencies, respectively, of George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan ? Today, U.S. Senator Ted Cruz' announcement of his bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination renews the relevance of reporting I did on Cruz in mid-2013. Senator Cruz' announcement has triggered an eruption, from the America left, of mockery and attacks on Cruz, for a wide array of reasons.
But there are more important stories to be told - on Cruz' longstanding ties to the elite leadership of the religious right and Christian right that has included a friendship, tracing back to the 1990s, with one of the movement's top architects who helped launch America's culture wars, and concerning the role of Ted Cruz and his father Rafael Cruz, in giving America George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan.
An international network of some of the world's most vitriolic Religious Right activists and self-proclaimed orthodox religious leaders is holding its ninth global conference in Salt Lake City, Utah in October 2015. The World Congress of Families' (WCF) conferences tend to attract thousands of participants and prominent religious and political leaders from all over the world.
If past conferences are any indication, many Americans may be shocked, but not entirely surprised, by the proceedings.
In 2008, Senator John McCain's campaign recognized that he needed to shore up his credentials with the Religious Right, which was skeptical about his views on critical social issues, his team went all out courting mega-church Pastor John Hagee. And when Hagee agreed to support McCain, it was a major coup. It didn't take long, however, for that coup to blow up in the Senator's face, as video surfaced of Hagee claiming that God had sent Adolph Hitler to hunt the Jews, chase them from Europe, and drive them to Palestine. McCain was forced to dump Hagee. Is Jeb Bush making the same type of McCain-like deal by taking on the unbridled conservatism of Jordan Sekulow?
Unless you're Mike Huckabee or Rick Santorum and you don't need a liaison to the Religious Right because you are your own liaison, Republican Party presidential candidates need someone to hook them up. George H.W. Bush had Doug Wead, George W. Bush had Tim Goeglein, and now Jeb Bush's Right to RISE PAC has landed Jordan Sekulow, as a senior adviser. Say goodbye to compassionate conservatism and hello to a hardcore anti-gay, anti-abortion culture warrior.
Many leaders of the Christian Right, from megachurch pastors like Rick Warren to the top prelates in the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, have repeatedly threatened civil disobedience (and worse) over marriage equality. If they follow through on their claims, a summer of "martyrdom" may be at hand if the Supreme Court rules in favor of same-sex marriage this term.
The prison industrial complex ought to be thrilled by the prospect of the mass incarceration of Christian Right leaders willing to be martyred for their faith. Prison construction will be booming when the tyrannical Obama regime throws all those opponents of same-sex marriage in the hoosegow.
This is, of course, parody. But it is also the logical conclusion of the rhetoric and the beliefs of many on the Christian Right.
It is easy to mock those who talk big but don't deliver. But it is harder to accept the idea that archaic notions of "Christendom" animate the thinking of present day religious and political leaders. But just because it is harder to accept does not make it any less true.
print page
