December 8, 2006 5:57 AM

Jesus is a cash cow

The Christian Right Goes Back to Bible Boot Camp: After a study revealed that less than 10 percent of evangelicals were Bible literate, James Dobson’s Focus on the Family is desperately taking a two-day multimedia Bible boot camp on the road, selling “truth” for $179 a seat.

It’s been a rough season for the Christian right. Even for an eschatological movement, these are dark days. First came former Deputy Director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives David Kuo’s public admission that evangelicals were often derided as “nuts” and “goofy” within the inner sanctums of the Bush administration. Then, weeks before losing their shotgun seat in the 109th Congress, the booming voice of the National Association of Evangelicals, Ted Haggard, was silenced in a scandal involving a gay hooker, massage oils, methamphetamine, and a string of Denver hotel rooms booked under false names. But even before all that hit the fundamentalist fan, the movement was contending with a quieter, more systemic crisis: functional Biblical illiteracy among the flock. That’s right, religious conservatives aren’t so religious, after all.

Personally, I’m beside myself with excitement. I mean, how could anyone with a functional sense of humor NOT be excited when talking about an Evangelical preacher using this phrase?:

….a gay hooker, massage oils, methamphetamine, and a string of Denver hotel rooms booked under false names.

Ah, good times….

But, I digress. Yes, the important issue of the day is apparently former DUMB@$$ AWARD wiener Rev. James Dobson realizing that most “Christians” don’t know the Good Book from a Captain America comic book. Yes, in an America where reading anything more intellectually challenging than People magazine is anathema, surely Dobson can’t be surprised that most American Christians are spiritually illiterate. Can he?

Just how bad have things become? Well, it would seem that most Christians actually think that Genesis was a rock group from the 80’s and Moses (Malone) was a former center for the Philadelphia 76ers best known for shattering backboards on slam dunks.

Clearly, Dobson and his evil minions have their work cut out for them. I mean, when your career and lifestyle is dependent on preaching and enforcing lockstep ideological purity, insufficient fealty among the sheeple might just put you out of work.

This alarm was sounded by George Barna, chief pollster and CEO of the Barna Group, a Ventura, Calif.-based Christian polling and communications outfit. In August of 2005, Barna reported that less than ten percent of born-again Christians held what he termed a “Biblical worldview.” Based on his survey, very few grasped the nuances of scripture or believed in “Absolute Truth” any more than their secular counterparts; the “Body of Christ” had been infected with the virus of relativism, a wasting disease.

Uh…isn’t “Absolute Truth” a vodka?

“Although most people own a Bible and know some of its content,” reported Barna, “our research found that most [professed evangelicals] have little idea how to integrate core biblical principles to form a unified and meaningful response to the challenges and opportunities of life.”

Ah…I see the problem now. Barna is all atwitter because Christians have apparently not been sufficiently indoctrinated. (My God, THEY’RE THINKING FOR THEMSELVES!!!) Yes, this independent, critical thinking thing has got to go. You do know what independent thinking leads to…don’t you?

MORAL RELATIVISM!! (gasp!!)

SECULAR HUMANISM!! (shudder!!)

JON STEWART FOR PRESIDENT!! (yum!!)

Well, OK, so Jon Stewart probably isn’t going to run for President (he’s smarter than that), but you get the point. THIS IS SERIOUS, PEOPLE! Before you know it, Christians won’t even be going to church anymore…and then who’s going to pay for Joel Osteen’s Armani suits?

Personally, I think this is all much ado about nothing. It’s mostly Dobson realizing that he’s going to have to work a whole lot harder if he wants to brainwash enough people to maintain his ego-centric, power-mad lifestyle. It’s hard to rule a domain when your “subjects” don’t much care about your self-important pronouncements.

So, what’s a self-righteous, self-important DUMB@$$ to do? Well, you take your show on the road.

The result is Focus on the Family’s “The Truth Project: An In-Depth Christian Worldview Experience,” a slick and intensive two-day training conference that kicked-off a North American tour last month at a megachurch outside Atlanta. It has since visited sell-out audiences in six cities; there are already 10 events planned for 2007.

Yes, for the low, low price of $179, you can have the trolls at Focus on the Family tell you what to think and who to hate (Da Gayz, of course) so you won’t have to do the heavy lifting.

Call now, operators are standing by….

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on December 8, 2006 5:57 AM.

'Tis the season, eh? was the previous entry in this blog.

Another DUMB@$$ AWARD wiener is the next entry in this blog.

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